


i'm a ghost, you're an angel (one and the same)

by voxofthevoid



Series: i'm guilty of treason (i've abandoned control) [2]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Bearded Steve Rogers, Bucky is 32, Canon-Typical Violence, Captain America Steve Rogers/Modern Bucky Barnes, Commander Rogers, Daddy Kink Adjacent, Dominance and Submission, Enthusiastic Consent, Falling In Love, Implied Medical Procedures, Intergluteal Sex, M/M, Older Man/Younger Man, Oral Sex, Porn with Feelings, Rimming, Rough Oral Sex, SHIELD Agent Bucky Barnes, Steve is 103, Titfucking, Wall Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-10
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-06-24 21:04:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 31,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19731760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voxofthevoid/pseuds/voxofthevoid
Summary: “You fucked him.”Bucky licks his lips and nods. Fury lets out a deep breath and leans back in his chair in a movement that’s terrifyingly controlled but spills danger out the edges.“Twenty years,” Fury says slowly, taking special care to imbue each word with his personal brand of bone-chilling judgement. It used to make Bucky quiver in his boots back when he was a baby S.H.I.E.L.D agent with two functional arms. “In that time, I have asked, threatened, coaxed, and damn near begged this man to work for us, or at least with us, and what finally gets it done is yourdick?”“Ass.”“Excuse me?”“Listen, I’m not saying any part of my anatomy is what persuaded Commander Rogers to agree to this, but hypothetically, if that’s what did it, let’s just say he would have found my ass far more persuasive than my dick.” Bucky pauses, secretly relishing the sour-lemon look on Fury’s face. “It still hurts, in case you’re wondering.”-Steve tries to seduce Bucky over to the dark side. But the Avengers are more grey than dark, and it’s still a paler shade of grey than what S.H.I.E.L.D’s got going nine times out of ten. Bucky really should be more concerned about the seduction part.





	1. lost in a daydream (what do you see)

**Author's Note:**

> Predictably enough, the sequel also ended up longer than I expected. It's mostly Bucky having emotions with his heart and dick both. 
> 
> My [tumblr's here](https://voxofthevoid.tumblr.com/) if you wanna come say hi.

“You fucked him.”

Bucky licks his lips, nods. He doesn’t avert his eyes, meeting Fury head-on because he isn’t ashamed, not of this.

Fury lets out a deep breath and leans back in his chair in a movement that’s terrifyingly controlled but spills danger out the edges. Hill is at her customary spot at his side, sporting a familiar look of exasperation, and as usual, Bucky can’t tell whether it’s directed at him, Fury, or possibly life for conspiring to surround her with men and their idiocies.

“Twenty years,” Fury says slowly, taking special care to imbue each word with his personal brand of bone-chilling judgement. It used to make Bucky quiver in his boots back when he was a baby S.H.I.E.L.D agent with two functional arms. “In that time, I have asked, threatened, coaxed, and damn near begged this man to work for us, or at least with us, and what finally gets it done is your _dick_?”

Bucky shrugs.

“Ass.”

“Excuse me?”

“Listen, I’m not saying any part of my anatomy is what persuaded Commander Rogers to agree to this, but hypothetically, if that’s what did it, let’s just say he would have found my ass far more persuasive than my dick.” Bucky pauses, secretly relishing the sour-lemon look on Fury’s face. “It still hurts, in case you’re wondering.”

“I’m _not_ ,” Fury says sharply. Hill just snorts.

“That said,” Bucky continues casually, pretending to be much calmer than he really is, “Commander Rogers won’t fall for this. A toddler won’t fall for this.”

“Be that as it may,” Hill says before Fury can tell Bucky to shove his opinion up his extremely sore asshole, “This is our best shot at the Avengers. Possibly our only one. You’re right, they’ll be prepared. Rogers is no one’s fool and he suffers none, but he proposed this compromise and asked for you, specifically. We can’t waste this chance.”

“Whether or not he’s a fool is up for reevaluation,” Fury mutters darkly, glaring at Bucky with that telltale twitch in his eyebrow. Bucky huffs but doesn’t take much offense. The last time someone tried to pull a honeypot on Nick Fury, they ended up being the stuff of S.H.I.E.L.D gossip as their greatest horror story. The difference here is that Bucky didn’t set out to seduce Steve and doing so sure as hell didn’t help him pull a magical escape, as Fury damn well knows.

But apparently, it doesn’t matter that Bucky only spread his legs after Fury and Steve negotiated for his return. The leader of the Avengers has such an ironclad reputation that even this seeming flaw in his integrity is considered an opportunity that can be exploited, with Bucky as the weapon. And he knows damn well that no matter how much he protests, Fury won’t budge from his decision. Hill won’t back him up either.

Bucky sighs.

“I just want it on record that I think this a stupid idea. Can I leave now?”

He’s tired to his bone, his ass is burning, and there’s an ache somewhere in his chest that’s got the shape of a name he still hasn’t said out loud.

It's stupid, missing a man he’s known for a handful of days and fucked once, but he does.

He misses Steve.

It’s a curiously wholesome feeling. There’s no bitterness for the secrets because that’s all they are in this line of work; humans in the shape of codes. He doesn’t care that Steve drugged him again before handing him back to S.H.I.E.L.D because he asked permission first and sat there with Bucky tucked to his side as the sedative took effect. Kissed his lips right before he went under and promised to see him again.

It's a promise he’ll fulfill; one that Fury, of all people, is trying to facilitate, but whatever compromise Steve reached with Fury, Bucky is a hundred percent sure that it doesn’t involve allowing Bucky to spy on him.

He doesn’t want to do it, is the thing. It’s not just sentiment, though there’s that too, something in Bucky rankling at the thought of looking into Steve’s gorgeous blue eyes and lying. Treachery is nothing new to him, but it’s different this time, stupid as it might be to be so attached after a tryst so brief. But there’s more to it too; Steve’s a sharp man, and even a brief flip through the dossier Hill handed him is enough to impress and intimidate Bucky. That’s not a man who’ll fall for something so obvious, no matter how sweet he finds Bucky’s ass.

And that’s a lot, he knows, fighting off a smile at the memories.

“Noted,” Fury says drily. “Go home and read through those files, Barnes. You move out in three days. Now get out of my office.”

Bucky snaps a sloppy salute and happily fucks off.

It’s a short drive to his apartment, and there’s not much traffic in the dark of fuck-o-clock. S.H.I.E.L.D never sleeps, though, and sometimes, it’s determined not to let its agents sleep either. Bucky’s not so exhausted that he’s a danger to anyone behind the wheel, but his thoughts do wander, to starshine hair and eyes a deeper blue than any ocean. Pain flares now and then, his body littered with the marks of three long hours of debauchery. Ass fucked raw and hips bruised and lips bitten, he’s aching everywhere. Each throb of pain reminds Bucky of huge hands and broad shoulders and a mouth that did him just right.

When he steps into his second-floor apartment, Bucky remembers Steve’s blithe comment that he knew this place didn’t have a basement and wonders whether he’s watching now, as Bucky stripes out of S.H.I.E.L.D-branded clothes and slides into the shower. He’s too tired to jerk off, though the hot shower’s an orgasmic experience all on its own. He pulls on pajama pants and groans when they drag over the bruises Steve spanked onto his ass.

Then he sweeps the entire apartment for bugs and finds a whole fucking dozen of them, courtesy of his own employers. He huffs but leaves them be.

-

The mission is simple, as far as missions go.

Infiltrate the Avengers, a task made easy enough by the fact that Bucky’s been cordially invited to join the lot on missions by their exalted leader himself. Gather information on the members, which is again easy on paper given that Bucky will inevitably interact with some of them and presumably fight together with them. He’ll gather some data. It’s inevitable, really.

It would be useless too, typically, because S.H.I.E.L.D’s rather obsessive about keeping fat dossiers on enhanced individuals throughout the world, but especially America and Europe. But one casual read-through of the files given to him tells Bucky why Fury is so hellbent on Bucky biting the hand trying to, if not feed him, at least pet him a little bit.

God, he wants Steve to pet him a little bit. A lot. Those fucking hands, all huge and hot, and the things they did to Bucky–

Focus.

Everyone knows the Avengers, the name coined by Tony fucking Stark, of all people. They were the saving grace of Earth back in 2012, dropping out of the sky alongside their alien counterparts, right in time to save Sam from a grisly death via space whale. Bucky was on a mission in Bucharest at the time, and he remembers, crystal clear, standing frozen in his apartment as the news anchors lost their shit, the sweetness of the plums he ate earlier turning bitter-sour on his tongue as his city got ripped apart.

The Avengers have no faces, no names. Just masks. They certainly didn’t give a press conference before vanishing in the aftermath of a fucking nuke being diverted to a hole in the sky. The public gave – and continues to give – them monikers; some stick, some don’t.

Bucky remembers the footage, remembers the hulking man in black, blue, and desert-brown with a slate grey shield on his arm. There were no stars or stripes anywhere on him, and his face was hidden behind a cowl and a mask not dissimilar to the one Bucky wears on missions. He can now connect him to Steve, to Commander Rogers, the first Captain America, ironically fighting beside Sam, the fifth Captain America.

There are other names too though, little snippets of information that were beyond Bucky’s clearance level until around twenty hours ago.

Clint Barton, Hawkeye; the archer from New York, and a S.H.I.E.L.D defector, for some godforsaken reason. Natalia Alianovna Romanova, Black Widow; ex-KGB, once on S.H.I.E.L.D’s kill list and now not. Clint has a face, but Romanova’s file only has a note that proposes she might have chameleon-like powers. She never has the same face, apparently. Bucky thinks it’s testament of a world too used to superpowers that good old-fashioned subterfuge doesn’t quite make the cut. But who knows, maybe she is a shape-shifter. Maybe Bucky has already met her.

Then there’s Rogers. They’ve got most on him. He’s the face of the Avengers, not to the public but to other agencies. Bucky reads over the information, but a lot of it’s known to him, and the rest are dry mission reports that nonetheless say quite a lot about the man’s tactical capabilities. No one seems sure, but they say Rogers is no longer active on the field with the exception of world-ending threats like the Chitauri. Bucky remembers the strength of that broad, battle-worn body and wonders whether that’s true.

The actual names end there. But if there’s one thing S.H.I.E.L.D’s good at, it’s code names, and there are so many of those. He knows some of the more notorious ones – Iron Man, Hulk, Scarlet Witch. There are others too – Quicksilver, Spiderman, Ant-Man, Wasp, Rescue – and Bucky’s eyebrows have all but vanished into his hairline by the time he realizes that these are mostly self-professed titles and not S.H.I.E.L.D’s inventions.

Fucking vigilantes, but then, he doesn’t have a leg to stand on, does he, given that he’s either the Ghost or the Winter Soldier depending upon the situation.

They’re a sizeable group, and one that seems to be growing with time. The Avengers that swooped in to save New York was a five-person group. Thor was another matter entirely, a distinct faction all on his own, but there is a note that the fucking _god_ is known to work with them sometimes. Even counting that, the Avengers are certainly larger than that now, and Bucky spends some time wondering where and how Steve finds them because it’s far easier than thinking about the daunting task that’s been assigned to him.

Bucky’s not one to fail a mission easily, and he’s certainly never wanted to fail one. He still doesn’t, but he does wish that would feel a little less like betrayal.

-

It’s all very hush-hush, even by the usual S.H.I.E.L.D standards. Not that S.H.I.E.L.D has much to do with any of this; whatever agreement Steve wrangled from Fury, it got him to leave the bulk of the work to Bucky. It’s the kind of hands-off, long-leash approach that Bucky doesn’t quite trust in these particular circumstances and doesn’t expect Steve to fall for, and he’s proven right in spectacular fashion.

The day the Avengers are supposed to contact him to arrange their first joint mission, Bucky snaps awake in the middle of the night, left arm swinging.

Strong fingers clamp around his wrist, arresting the blow. A familiar voice halts Bucky’s struggle before it can even begin.

“Good morning, Buck.”

The tension doesn’t bleed out of him, and his heart doesn’t conveniently slow down, but the violence thrumming under his skin does abate as fight-or-flight takes a backseat to calm evaluation.

“This is how people get stabbed, Steve,” Bucky mutters darkly, wrenching his hand out of Steve’s grip. “What the fuck?”

He sits up, and the giant shadow looming over him shifts to let him. Steve sits on the edge of the bed without bothering to ask permission, the heat of his body too damn close for the proper functioning of Bucky’s rational mind.

“Widow wanted to come fetch you, so I figured I’d spare you the trauma,” Steve says conversationally. Bucky’s eyes, adjusting to the darkness, can make out the movement of his mouth as he speaks. It’s terribly distracting. “You called me Steve.”

“Wha – I, well, yeah, you told me I could.”

“You didn’t, before.”

“I was your prisoner before, and let’s be real, I figured calling you sir would get me into your pants way faster, and why are we talking about this, what do you mean the Widow wanted to fetch me?”

“She’s paranoid. To a healthy degree,” Steve adds unconvincingly. “And getting into my pants would have been easier than you’re making it out to be, at least for you.”

Bucky doesn’t resist the warmth that suffuses him at those words, but he can also practically feel Fury’s judgmental stare. But fuck it, Steve started it, and if Commander America can be horny-on-main, Bucky can be too.

But it’s still too early for this shit.

“What time is it,” Bucky asks, already reaching for his phone.

“Just past three,” Steve says as Bucky confirms as much on his phone. His alarm, set for nearly four hours from now, peers sadly at Bucky when he turns it off. Or maybe he’s projecting.

“What the fuck,” he huffs again, just because he can, tempted beyond words to just collapse back on his mattress. He won’t, but he wants to, and he’s well aware that he wouldn’t dare be so tempted if he viewed Steve as a real danger.

Not to say he’s not dangerous, Bucky thinks, rolling out of bed while keeping a respectable distance between himself and the man still perched on his bed. He can feel Steve’s eyes on him, and it makes him hyperaware of his half-naked state. Nothing Steve hasn’t seen before, and that’s the problem right there.

Bucky clears his throat in an awkward attempt to dispel the pregnant silence.

“I need coffee for this. Want any?”

“If it’s not too much trouble.”

“You’re asking me that after you broke into my house at three in the morning, Steve.”

“I like you saying my name.”

Bucky almost trips over his feet in his haste to get out of the room and forgets to get dressed in the process. It doesn’t win him much of a respite either, just enough that Steve doesn’t see his flaming cheeks until the blush recedes.

Bucky’s intently bringing the milk to a boil when Steve ambles into the kitchen. He leans at the counter beside Bucky, close enough to reach out and touch. Bucky half-expects him to crowd him in, a tried and true cliché, but when he sneaks a glance, Steve’s watching the milk with curious eyes.

“Lemme guess, you’re one of those give me plain black coffee or give me death types,” Bucky says, not bothering to hide his disdain.

Steve chuckles and leans a little towards Bucky, who turns off the milk a little earlier than he usually would.

“Not at all. Caffeine doesn’t affect me any more than alcohol does. When I drink coffee or tea, it’s for the taste.”

“Oh, okay,” Bucky mumbles, fumbling with the mugs. “Sorry. I make cheap instant coffee with milk and got the audacity to actually like it. Let’s just say I’m tired of all the judgement.”

Steve says nothing, but when Bucky risks another look at him, he’s smiling brightly, his mouth a slash of insanely pretty pink between that goddamned beard.

God fuck it, they’re talking about _coffee_ , what the hell is this.

Steve drinks what Bucky gives with without complaint or commentary, but he does drain his cup which vindicates Bucky for some reason he’s not willing to examine too closely. All the same, it doesn’t take long for the silence between them to grow loud with all the things they’re not saying.

Bucky puts down his mug with a very controlled movement and turns to Steve.

“Okay. First things first, don’t break into my fucking house.”

Steve manages an expression that’s not at all apologetic but still oozes sincere regret.

“I understand why you’re angry, Buck–”

“I’m not angry, I’m _irritated_.”

Steve doesn’t so much as blink at the interruption, but his eyes do sharpen.

“Understandably so,” Steve murmurs. “But it was either me or the Widow, and she would’ve just hauled you off, forgiveness than permission, all that. Sometimes, I think I haven’t been a very good role model.”

It’s a joke, from the twinkle in Steve’s eyes to the breezy tone, but Bucky’s not feeling very amused.

“She the one who got me last time?”

Steve inclines his head and folds his arms across his chest, which should make him look defensive but instead tweaks the conventions of body language to make him seem solidly anchored to place. Bucky’s eyes linger on the bulge of his biceps, obscenely defined under that thin T-shirt he’s wearing. He didn’t think Steve’s suit would be kinder on his libido than civilian clothing but here they are.

“Great,” Bucky mutters, arm recalibrating as he leans back against the counter, gripping hard so he won’t reach out to Steve and cop a feel. “This is the kinda shit that makes me question my life choices, Steve.”

“Believe it or not, I do understand,” Steve says and promptly destroys any chance Bucky has of digesting his words by stepping closer, right into his space.

From anyone else, it would be domineering aggression and Bucky would show them just where to shove it, and it’s still domineering aggression from Steve, but the difference is that Bucky has to fight not to arch his back and bare his neck and pick up where they left off.

Steve leans in, mere inches separating their bodies, the heat of him blanketing Bucky, and gentle touches his lips to Bucky’s ear.

“They’re listening,” he says, and it’s funny, how ice can burst in your veins when a moment ago, you were burning. “You know, don’t you?”

Bucky shudders, whole body singing at the threat underlying the question. Steve’s hands are on the counter on either side of Bucky’s hips, caging him in. His brain and his body are in conflict, arousal warring with caution.

He’s got a decision to make, but Bucky knows the moment he chooses that it was never really a choice.

He slides his hands up Steve’s muscled arms, caressing the sculpted muscles, digging his fingers, flesh and metal, into those strong shoulders. He turns his head, just enough that he can murmur a response to the side of Steve’s face.

“I do,” he says, honest. “Are you surprised?”

The answer is two hands grabbing by the hips and hoisting him onto the counter.

Bucky wraps his legs around Steve instinctively, calves looped loosely around thick thighs. Steve rests his forehead against Bucky’s, faces so close their breaths brush.

“No.” It’s a soft exhalation, warm on Bucky’s lips. “You see why I’m here, now.”

Bucky can make an educated guess, spies and their games, but what’s the point anymore? Steve’s here, Fury knows he’s here, and wherever he’s going to whisk Bucky away to, he’s not going to let himself be followed. That’s fine, that’s not the mission, and Bucky can allow himself this distraction.

“To give them a show?” Bucky says under his breath, all but kissing Steve. He tightens his legs around Steve. The next part, he says louder, for God and S.H.I.E.L.D to hear. “Fucking the enemy, how far you’ve fallen.”

Steve’s laugh rumbles through his chest.

“You’re not the enemy.”

When he steps away, it’s with Bucky clinging to him, their mouths open and hungry together.

-

Steve fucks him in his bed, Bucky on his back, legs over Steve’s shoulders. It’s simple, brutal, flesh slamming into flesh, slick skin pressed close.

He doesn’t call Bucky son or kid, doesn’t call him sweetheart, but he bites a necklace of bruises on his neck, bites his lips till he bleeds, and drives into him until they’re spent and sated and sharing a secret.

-

“At least you didn’t drug me this time,” Bucky says optimistically, standing in the middle of a field in the middle of nowhere.

“I asked permission last time,” Steve points out mildly.

“Not the time before that.”

“You were the enemy then,” is the response, and when Bucky meets Steve’s eyes, they don’t hold a question they should. Bucky’s quick to look away.

He’s disconcerted, off his game, and it only has half to do with being dragged – alright, politely _led_ – out of his house before dawn in clothes that don’t even belong to him. The other half’s all Steve and a one-hour ride on the back of an honest-to-god motorcycle.

Close his eyes, and Bucky’s back on it again, its roaring purr between his thighs and Steve’s muscled back plastered to his front.

 _Compromised_ , he registers distantly, in a way he can’t let be real just yet. _I’m compromised_.

The mission isn’t, not yet. Fury would have been expecting Bucky to fuck Steve again. The potential spanner in the works is that Steve was expecting Fury to expect it, and fucking hell, this is why Bucky doesn’t mix pleasure with business.

Steve’s hand settles at the small of his back, and Bucky can’t feel him through the leather jacket Steve draped over him before they got on his bike, but the skin under it warms anyway.

“Changed your mind?” Steve asks.

“I have a mission.”

“Then finish it,” Steve says, like it can ever be that easy. But when Bucky slants a sideways glance at him, he finds Steve smiling tight-lipped like he knows exactly what he’s asking.

They lapse into silence, but it’s not so bad.

Bucky doesn’t know what they’re waiting for, and he doesn’t like it, but somehow, he can’t bring himself to ask. And when his unsaid question is answered, it’s almost worth the suspense.

He feels it first, wind whipping his hair and a loud, whirring noise that gets the plates on his arms shifting, ready for combat. Steve, hand still on Bucky’s back, is implacable, even as the air ripples to reveal an aircraft hovering several feet above their heads.

“Sweet Jesus,” Bucky murmurs, gaping up at the jet. It reminds him of a Quinjet, though the design is clearly different. It’s around the same size but darker in coloring, and Bucky’s no expert on aircraft, but even he can tell it’s a formidable piece of equipment.

“We call her the Iron Maiden,” Steve tells him, stepping closer to Bucky and speaking into his ear. “But don’t worry. She’s a sweetheart.”

Bucky does look at Steve like he’s lost his mind, but it’s not surprise that he feels. It’s almost reassuring; he’s not used to their kind of people being all that sane, and it’s good to know Steve’s got his own bit of crazy.

When the time comes, Bucky doesn’t hesitate to follow Steve into the jet.

-

The Avengers give Bucky his gear; a suit similar to the one he usually wears and his pick of weaponry. It’s ideal, as much as these things can be. Steve’s running the mission and, like the S.H.I.E.L.D file said, he won’t be out in the field. Bucky’s not too keen on letting strangers watch his back, but they’re in the same boat when it comes to him. Steve doesn’t sit them down and tell them to play nice like an overbearing father, but the expectation is there in his sweeping gaze. It settles hard and cold in Bucky’s gut, makes his spine snap straight.

The Black Widow and Hawkeye don’t seem as affected. Widow’s slinking around the jet with predatory grace, blond-haired and grey-eyed, and for all that Bucky surreptitiously stares at the ragged edges of her pixie cut, he can’t tell whether it’s a wig or her own hair. Her eyebrows are a darker blond than the bright platinum of her hair, perfectly natural. Hawkeye is slouched and snoring in his seat, and he looks the same as in the pictures taken when he was with S.H.I.E.L.D except for that questionable mohawk he’s sporting. It _looks_ like they’ve been ignoring Bucky after a perfunctory greeting where no names were said but were known anyway, but he’s not fooled. He’s read their files, the thickest stacks aside from Steve’s, and he’s not letting his guard down for a second.

He did, with Steve, even though he was more dangerous, could snap Bucky in half with the strength in those arms, but he can’t think about that now, can’t think about it at all if he knows what’s good for him. That doesn’t stop him from gravitating to the cockpit where Steve’s lounging in the pilot seat, autopilot engaged and eerily accurate.

“Nervous?” he asks when Bucky drops into the copilot’s seat, impervious to the unimpressed glare thrown at him in lieu of an answer.

Bucky keeps glaring for several more ineffectual seconds, until he starts feeling silly. Then he scowls but speaks anyway.

“Hardly. This is a milk run, more or less. This your usual kinda mission, sir, or am I just special?”

“Not Steve anymore, huh,” Steve doesn’t quite question. “And stick around, you’ll find out.”

“You are my Commander,” Bucky tells him, peering up at Steve from under his lashes because he’s not above playing dirty. “And you know what, maybe I will. Sir.”

Steve’s eyes narrow but amusement glints in their depths.

“You do that, kid.”

His touch is fleeting when he pats the top of Bucky’s head, but he feels it all the way down to the base of his spine.

-

Bucky spares a moment, between one shot and the next, to wonder when cleaning up A.I.M splinter cells became normal to him.

This one isn’t as bad as he’s seen it get. No forced mutations, no weird technology, just a rundown base in Ohio with a handful of scientists working frantically on something they seem nowhere close to achieving. Black Widow is extracting information and zapping the hell out of anyone unlucky enough to cross her path. Hawkeye and Bucky are perched in their spots, covering the two exits, picking off stragglers non-lethally. Steve’s a guiding voice on the comms, silent more often than not because they haven’t had any complications so far.

It's easy, a milk run like he told Steve, almost boring, or it would be if Bucky were doing this for S.H.I.E.L.D. This does fall under their purview, but then, Fury’s made no secret of his displeasure at the Avengers playing in his sandbox and having the audacity to bring their own toys.

Bucky’s not sure what _he_ is in that metaphor, and that’s the only thing that keeps him tense throughout the clean-up and after.

Interaction with the Romanova and Barton ends up being minimal. Mostly curt nods and a thumbs-up from Barton after they’re done tying up the wannabe mad scientists and their barely competent guards. Bucky almost asks them what they plan to do with them, but one look at her blank face and his disinterested expression stifles the urge. It’s not that he expects torture or anything particularly inhumane; the Avengers eventually hand over their captives to S.H.I.E.L.D or some other concerned party, another juicy tidbit Bucky learned recently. But if he wants details, these two won’t be the source.

He waits for the Iron Maiden to take off before he picks his way over to the cockpit.

Steve is scrolling through a holopad when Bucky drops in beside him, and he doesn’t do anything as satisfying as hastily close his file or change apps. Instead, he takes his sweet time, blue eyes roving over lines of text without flicking over to Bucky.

It’s childish, downright petulant, but Bucky just lets those words run through his mind when he stretches out a leg and pokes Steve in the thigh.

Steve freezes. For only a moment, but Bucky’s got a sniper’s eyes, he sees.

He waits until Steve resumes reading before poking him again.

The hand that clamps down on his ankle is as tight as a vice. Bucky shudders at the strength of that grip, bone grinding on bone even through thick leather, and first, the struggle is all instinct, but then he does it on purpose, wriggling his foot like it has a prayer of a chance at squirming out of Steve’s grasp.

It doesn’t, and he stops when Steve tightens his grip hard enough to pull a pained sound out of him. Steve eases up the next moment, but only to return to that initial pressure, hot and inescapable. Bucky drags his gaze away from Steve’s naked fingers wrapped around Bucky’s boot, up into eyes that are finally looking right at him. Steve holds his gaze for a long second before returning to his holopad.

He doesn’t let go of Bucky’s foot. Bucky doesn’t try to yank it away. They don’t speak a single word.

It’s maybe ten minutes later that Romanova joins them.

Bucky jerks his leg, an automatic reaction to hide, but Steve doesn’t budge, and it’s too late anyway, Romanova’s already looking intently at where they’re touching. Bucky watches her face, keeping his own expression soldier-blank, and doesn’t flinch away when she looks him right in the eye–

–and smiles.

It’s not a pleasant smile. Too sharp, too crooked, a warning and a threat tucked behind blood-red lips. But it’s not an outright declaration of murderous intent either. The real difference is when she turns to Steve, and that smile vanishes entirely just as her eyes soften indescribably.

“Proceed as planned?” she asks, tone brisk and businesslike, nothing strange to see here, no sir.

“Of course.” Rogers looks up from his holopad and gives her a gentle smile. “You owe me twenty.”

“Fuck you, Rogers,” she says pleasantly and strides out of the cockpit, but not before pulling two ten-dollar bills out of what seems to be the ether but is more likely some compartment in her skin-tight suit and slapping it on Steve’s lap.

Steve snorts and tucks the money away. He meets Bucky’s questioning gaze and winks.

“Can I speak now?” Bucky asks.

“I never said you couldn’t,” Steve points out the same moment Bucky realizes his mistake. He ducks his head, glad his hair’s loose and there to hide his face in a dark curtain.

“Yeah, well.” He clears his throat. “What now? What happens to the prisoners?”

 _And me_ , he doesn’t add, but the words manage to be hover in the air between them.

“A couple of my team wants to speak to them. After that, Fury can have them.”

“I’m sticking around that long?”

“Do you want to?”

Bucky makes the mistake of looking up and meeting Steve’s eyes, and the answer is pulled out of him, real and honest.

“I’ll do what you want me to.”

Steve’s eyes darken, and Bucky’s pulse quickens in response. There was no innuendo in his words, just plain truth, but he thinks that maybe that’s why Steve’s staring at him like he wants to fold Bucky into himself and eat him whole.

His fingers, still wrapped around Bucky’s boot-clad ankle, burns the skin.

“So you will,” Steve says, returning to his holopad.

Bucky stares blankly out at the wide blue sky, but when he sneaks glances at Steve, he finds him staring at a fixed point on the projection, the text static.

-

_Proceed as planned_ , Steve told Romanova, and apparently, the plan is Bucky and Steve being dropped at a nice countryside cottage that’s sickeningly idyllic while the other two fly off with their hapless prisoners.

Bucky is understandably grumpy.

“Don’t you need to be there for that,” he asks, arms crossed over his chest and glowering at the horizon. “Being their Commander and all.”

“They’re surprisingly self-sufficient,” Steve returns placidly. “Can feed and clothe themselves. Accidental explosions happen only once a week. Good enough.”

Bucky turns his glower on Steve.

“You’re fucking hilarious.”

“Language.”

“You’re very fucking selective with your censorship.”

Steve just cocks an eyebrow at him, twin arches of silver asking, _Am I now?_

“You sure have a filthy mouth when you’re balls deep in me. Don’t seem to give a fuck about what comes out of mine either.”

“That so?” Steve says mildly, the tone alone winding Bucky tight. “Maybe you should refresh my memory. I’m an old man, I forget these things.”

Bucky’s on Steve in an instant, not an attack, just an aggressive invasion of his space, hands on his chest and nose-to-nose.

“This why you licked up Fury’s asshole? So you can fuck me? Fuckin’ Christ, Steve, how desperate are you?”

There’s a stirring of something like real anger in Steve’s eyes, but the hands that grab Bucky’s wrists to pull them away from Steve’s body are infinitely controlled, exerting just the right amount of force to pry Bucky away. No unnecessary hurt.

But there’s a promise of violence in that deliberate lack of it, and it sets Bucky’s heart racing.

“If I just wanted to fuck you,” Steve tells him very softly, each word carefully weighed and released into the tense breath between their lips, “all I’d have to do is knock on your door and point at your bed. You’d spread those legs for me in a heartbeat, son, give it up so easy.”

Bucky makes an automatic denial, more noise than word. His cock gives an interested twitch, the traitor.

“You would,” Steve presses, with body and words, Bucky plastered against his front now, hands still held in that terrifyingly gentle grip. “You’d fucking beg me for it.”

“ _Steve_.”

“You aren’t here because you have a tight ass. I’ve seen your work. I’m not easily impressed, Bucky, but you make the cut. But I don’t trust you, and I certainly don’t trust Fury, not enough to risk my team.”

“But enough to risk yourself?” Bucky demands. “You’re fine being alone with me, getting into bed with me.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“So can your team.”

“They can. But they’re my team, my people, and I take care of what’s mine, Bucky Barnes.”

There’s a suggestion in those words, and it sinks down to Bucky’s bones, a ghost of a promise. He sways forward, tucking his head into the hollow of Steve’s neck. He smells like sweat and musk, familiar already like the breadth of his hands and the girth of his cock.

“They tell you to do this?” Steve asks, mouth at Bucky’s ear, like at his house this morning, mere hours ago for all that it feels like days. “I know they know. You tell ‘em how you screamed for me, Buck? They tell you to do it again?”

Bucky shakes his head, rubbing his face into Steve’s skin, half-hoping some of his scent will rub off on him.

“N-no. They know we fucked. They’ll sure as hell have figured out we still wanna. But I’m not on a honeypot mission, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“It’s what I’m asking. We do this, it’s gonna be because _you_ want to.”

“Christ.” Bucky grinds his hips forward, pressing his semi on Steve’s thigh. “That feel like I don’t want to? And the hell happened to your kind concern when you were screwing my brains out this morning?”

He can feel Steve swallow, Adam’s apple bobbing.

“Didn’t think,” he says, gravel in his voice, tugging at Bucky’s gut. “Came there to fetch you, not fuck you.”

And isn’t that something, hearing he affects this calm mountain of a man enough to push morals and principles to the side, pull out the pure animal lust with which he pounded Bucky in the morning.

“I want it,” Bucky promises, pulling back and tilting his head, mouth brushing Steve’s. “I want you.”

The kiss starts chaste and turns filthy in a heartbeat, Steve licking into Bucky’s mouth like a starving man.

Bucky kisses back with all he’s got, mission not forgotten but set aside because Steve doesn’t trust him for good reason and won’t give him a chance to snoop, but he can have this, still, Steve’s hands and mouth and burning body.

-

It’s the second bed in a single day that Bucky’s ending up in with Steve Rogers pressing him into the mattress, and this isn’t a turn he thought his life would ever take, but he’s not complaining, good sense be fucked.

He whines when Steve shifts his suffocating weight off him, hovering over Bucky instead of blanketing him. It’s easier to breathe, physically, but the sight of Steve with mussed hair and kiss-swollen lips punches the air right out of Bucky’s gasping lungs.

“Come back,” he rasps, pulling ineffectually at Steve’s shoulders. Steve does swoop back in, but only for a kiss, filthy but fast, tongue swiping wetly over Bucky’s lips.

Then he’s pulling further away, Bucky’s protesting grumble summarily ignored. He’s distracted easily enough by the movement of Steve’s bulging muscles under his skin. There’s very little hair on him, and Bucky feels almost blinded by his glowing skin and ripped muscles. He’s a hundred-year old man who looks like he’s in his fifties, and he’s probably the healthiest human specimen Bucky’s ever laid eyes on. It trips him up each time, and sure, this is only the third time Steve’s been naked for him, but he doesn’t ever want to lose this little shock of pleasure at the view.

When he drags his eyes up Steve’s body to his face, he’s caught and held in a knowing stare.

Steve smiles suddenly, faint but real.

“Turn over,” he commands, tapping Bucky’s hips, turning the touch into a slow caress of Bucky’s thigh, fingertips trailing along sensitive skin. Bucky shivers and obeys, wrestling his trembling body onto his belly and rising to all fours, legs spreading in invitation.

He lets out a shuddering breath when Steve settles between his legs, the bulk of him forcing Bucky’s legs wider. He’s still sore from the morning, when Steve shoved two perfunctory fingers into him and then fucked him open with his cock. He’s gentle, now, the pad of his thumb ghosting over Bucky’s hole.

“Look at you,” he murmurs, using one oversized hand to spread Bucky’s ass. It makes him feel exposed, vulnerable, something so delicate bared so wantonly.

Bucky shoves his heated face into a pillow.

“All cute and swollen,” Steve says, and Bucky keens like he can drown out the words and douse the heat on his cheeks. Steve pays him no mind, only asks, “Does it hurt, sweetheart?”

Bucky wants to lie, say no and wriggle his way back onto Steve’s cock, and he doesn’t know if it’s machismo or sheer fucking thirst prompting it. But there’s something about Steve that coaxes the truth out of him, all shy and sweet.

“A little,” he mumbles, mostly into his pillow. “S’sore.”

“Aw,” Steve says, sympathy and condescension packed into one, low syllable. It goes right to Bucky’s dick, gets him dripping. “It’s alright, kid. I’ll take care of you.”

It’s a promise, and it’s lightning in Bucky’s blood, sparking up his insides.

He’s nowhere close to recovered when Steve spreads his cheeks wide with both hands and buries his face between them.

Bucky jolts, a cry fluttering weakly in his throat. Steve’s beard scratches his skin, and for all that it’s exquisitely soft under Bucky’s fingers and against his face, it’s different when it’s pressed up against the sensitive skin down there. He’s squirming in seconds, not that it helps, only makes his cheeks rub back into Steve’s face.

And then Steve licks at his hole, tongue hot and wet, and Bucky arches his back with a howl.

It’s not an attempt at escape, there’s nowhere he wants to go, but Steve’s hands clench down hard anyway, immobilizing Bucky’s hips. It feels like permission too, like he’s telling Bucky he can writhe and thrash to his heart’s content, but Steve’s got him, won’t let go of him.

“Fuck,” he gasps deliriously. “Son of a – fuck, _sir_.”

Steve’s answering hum is pressed into Bucky’s ass, thrumming up his insides, and words flee him entirely. Steve licks again, the flat of his tongue all up against Bucky’s hole, and it feels _so good_ , a soothing warmth against the sore, swollen flesh. Steve does it again, and again, and Bucky finds himself melting, body relaxing out of its trembling tenseness. There’s no pause to the needy noises Steve’s mouth pries out of him, but they’re sweet little pleas, not urgent demands, encouragement for the broad swipes of Steve’s tongue and teasing nips of his teeth.

Steve pulls back a bit, says something that falls soft and breathy on Bucky’s flesh but doesn’t penetrate the ringing in his ears. He dives back into Bucky’s ass without waiting for a response, licking _in_ this time, tongue sliding in easy and crooking to catch a taste. Bucky pants his pleasure into the pillow, boneless and damn near breathless. His cock’s aching between his legs, precum making a mess of the sheets, but he doesn’t want to reach down and take hold of it. It’s partly that he doesn’t think he can move without shaking apart into a thousand pieces, but mostly, it’s Steve, holding Bucky’s pleasure in an iron grip, playing his body like a favored instrument.

 _Touch me, please_ , Bucky wants to say, but he can’t twist his tongue to form meaningful sounds, only desperate little noises that fill up the room.

Maybe Steve reads his mind, or maybe he’s just learned Bucky’s body in the few hours they’ve stolen together, because one large hand wraps around Bucky’s cock. The strokes are slow and leisurely, matching the maddening sweetness of Steve’s mouth at his hole. It still takes nothing, only a few, firm pulls for Bucky to shudder headlong into his orgasm.

His mouth opens in a soundless scream as he shakes through the torrent of pleasure, cock pulsing in Steve’s fist and rim twitching against his mouth. Steve licks him through it, hand still at the base of Bucky’s cock but tongue swiping wet and dirty over his hole, triggering wave after wave of sensation. Bucky’s damn near mad with it by the time it’s done, slumped face-first on the bed.

Steve pulls back but not before pressing a close-mouthed kiss to Bucky’s hole, something about it making his chest squeeze tight.

Bucky’s limp like a doll when Steve turns him over, eyes closed and breathing hard, slick all over with sweat. He makes a low noise when fingers slide through the mess on his belly, smearing come on his skin. They nudge his lips in silent demand, and Bucky opens right up, licking his own bitter release off Steve’s fingers. He sucks lightly at the digits even once they’re clean, slitting his eyes open to peer at Steve who’s staring intently at Bucky’s mouth stretched around his fingers.

As if sensing Bucky’s gaze, Steve’s eyes flick upwards. Their blue’s darker now, nearly black, and Bucky’s filled with buoyant pride because he did this, he got Steve this hot.

“Pretty little boy,” Steve whispers like a secret, and Bucky moans around the fingers in his mouth. “Yeah? You like that, Buck? Like being my boy?”

Bucky nods, a little frantic, hot all over and thrumming in that way that would get him hard and aching if he didn’t already shoot all over himself.

“Ssh,” Steve soothes, stroking his fingers silken-smooth over Bucky’s tongue. “I know, I got you. I’ll take good care of you, kid.”

And Bucky believes him, god help him.

He spreads his legs a little wider and lifts his hips, urging Steve inside. He’s rewarded with a sharp inhalation and Steve’s eyes dropping to the mess still painting Bucky’s skin. He licks his lips, and Bucky’s mouth aches to feel the motion against his own lips.

And then Steve says, “Not this time.”

Bucky makes a sound, soft, pitiful, _crushed_ , and it’s something else, how quick Steve is to swoop down with a kiss, his tongue replacing his fingers in Bucky’s mouth as he kisses the dejection out of him.

“I want to,” Steve mutters in between biting presses of his mouth. “God, Buck, I wanna, but you’re sore, hm, sweetheart? Kissed it all better, didn’t I? Can’t ruin my hard work just because you’re gagging for it.”

Bucky makes a sharp, surprised noise into the kiss, clutching at Steve’s shoulders like that will help him keep his composure in the face of words that reach deep into him and gives a hot, merciless tug. Steve keeps kissing him, and Bucky opens for it, doesn’t care where Steve’s mouth has been. _Likes_ it, the dirtiness of it, the taste of himself on Steve’s tongue and teeth and lips. Gets drunk on it, hot and squirming and desperate, just like Steve pegged him to be.

“Wanna make you come,” Bucky gasps when he’s allowed a breather. He scrapes his nails down Steve’s back, aching to leave marks, his own bruises throbbing on his neck. “Please, sir.”

“Such a sweet boy,” Steve mouths against his jaw. There’s a wet kiss, followed by nipping teeth. Bucky hisses an incoherent curse. “So good for me.”

Bucky wants to be good for him, god, he wants it so bad.

“Please,” he begs again, clinging to Steve with his fingertips, baring his throat for sucking kisses that burn something fierce over the bruises already littering the skin there.

Steve says nothing, just kisses his way down Bucky’s body, pausing at his chest. He presses two sweet kisses to both peaked nipples, tongue swiping out to tease. And then he buries his face square between Bucky’s pecs.

Bucky starts, making a high, reedy sound. His hands fly up to grab Steve’s hair, fingers sinking into the thick, silver strands.

Steve seems right and happy where he is, rubbing his face between Bucky’s pecs like he wants to give him beard burn there to match the smarting skin of Bucky’s ass. It’s a nice thought, one that would get Bucky writhing if not for Steve pinning him with his body.

When Steve raises his face, his eyes are gleaming with something dark and wicked.

“You want to make me come, Buck?”

Bucky’s nodding, not even hesitating. He’d sign over his soul if Steve asked him like that, and he’d dare anyone to do otherwise.

“Oh, sweetheart. You gonna let me fuck your tits?”

Oh, _oh_ , fuck.

Bucky fucking keens, but he’s nodding too, fingers winding so tight in Steve’s hair that it’s gotta be painful. But Steve just breaths out shakily, eyes going half-lidded as Bucky loses it under him.

The fingers that clamp on his jaw and shut him up is a damn relief.

“Use your words, son. I want to hear it.”

“ _Please_.” Bucky doesn’t even recognize his voice, the high-pitched whistle of it. “Please, yes, sir.”

“Please, what?”

And sweet hell, he doesn’t know how this turned into him asking for it.

“Please fuck my tits,” Bucky says in a daze, face burning and insides all twisted up. “I want it so bad, sir.”

“I know you do, sweetheart,” Steve croons, that deep voice gone all low and syrupy. It hits Bucky like sledgehammer. “S’alright. Said I’d take care of you, didn’t I?”

And then Steve’s moving away again, and Bucky’s reaching out helplessly, needing him close. Steve’s huge hands close around his, dwarfing them though Bucky’s got perfectly normal-sized hands. And he likes it, fucking loves it, how small Steve makes him feel.

Steve doesn’t let go of his hands as he maneuvers himself up Bucky’s body, thighs bulging obscenely when settles with his legs on either side of Bucky’s torso. It puts Steve’s dick, fat with blood and so fucking gorgeous, tantalizingly close to Bucky’s mouth. All he’s got to do is strain his neck and lean forward. He can almost taste it, the flushed, dripping head peaking out of the foreskin.

He does try, but then Steve’s got a whole fucking palm flattened on his face, pushing Bucky soundly back into the pillow and keeping him there like he’s an insolent puppy Steve just happens to be fond of.

His hips jerk, limp cock giving a valiant attempt at plumping back up.

“So goddamn needy,” Steve says, sighing with a smile that fools no one. Bucky mumbles a protest against the hand pinning his head down. “Hush. Later, kid. I’ll give it to you, don’t you worry. Grab your tits for me, sweetheart. Push them together, that’s it, all nice and tight for me.”

Bucky’s hands, metal and flesh, flex almost painfully around their handfuls, tearing a little whine out of him. Steve takes his hand off his face, fingers trailing along his jaw in a soft caress.

And then he’s bracing his hands on either side of Bucky’s head and sliding his cock between his pecs.

It takes the first thrust for Bucky to remember that no one’s ever done this to him before. Sure, his sex life’s been sporadic lately, and bland to boot, but even in his most adventurous days, no one’s wanted to fuck his tits, no one’s even called them tits, but Steve is, Steve does, and Bucky _likes_ it, likes the odd but strangely erotic sensation of a hot cock sliding between his muscles and teasing the hungry moue of his mouth before pulling back.

Precum smears on his chin, and Bucky flicks out his tongue for a taste, groaning low from the tang of it on his tongue and the heat of Steve’s cock pressed tight to his chest.

“Christ, you want it bad,” Steve says, panting above Bucky, eyes intent on Bucky’s open mouth. “That desperate for a taste, kid?”

“Yes,” Bucky chokes out, and Steve lets him, lets his lips wrap around the head on the next thrust. It’s perfect and not enough, but then Steve’s pulling back and fucking Bucky’s tits harder, faster, and all Bucky can do is keep his chest bunched up the way Steve wants and leave his mouth open and panting for an errant taste.

He loses himself to the rhythm of it, breaths coming in ragged gasps like he’s the one with pistoning hips, body hot all over and mind wrapped a pleasant haze, every iota of him reduced to the heat of Steve’s cock and the sounds he’s making. The words, when Steve says them, takes a moment to register but they do, right on time.

“Close your eyes.”

Bucky does, squeezing them shut, just as Steve spills all over his face and chest. He catches some in his open mouth and moans out loud, shocked pleasure shuddering up his spine. He swallows, licks his lips, savoring the taste. Steve’s done, now, breathing hard, his cock soft and limp on Bucky’s chest. His come’s patches of heat along Bucky’s face, neck, and pecs, and Bucky tentatively opens his eyes, blinking them twice before managing to focus on Steve’s face.

His flush is almost hidden under the beard, but only almost, and it makes him look younger in a way that’s not quite physical. He’s a beautiful man, and Bucky’s breath catches in his throat, then leaves him sharply when Steve’s eyes flash open to meet his.

There’s very little to elegance to the way Steve scrambles off Bucky and topples to the bed, sprawling happily on his back, half of his ridiculous long limbs splayed over Bucky who’s enamored beyond belief at this man.

It’s like Steve gives himself five seconds to play starfish and relax because after that, he’s pulling all his limbs back to himself and turning to his side, facing Bucky.

“Hey.”

Bucky’s tempted to mirror the position, but he’s got dried semen on his nether regions and a rather fresh helping of it along his upper half, so he’s content to just lie on his back and turn his head to meet Steve’s gentle gaze.

“Hi.”

Steve smiles, and it’s a faint little thing, like most of his genuine smiles. Something like triumph sparks in Bucky’s chest at this knowledge.

“You good there, Buck?”

“I’m perfect,” Bucky says a little dreamily. He lowers his eyes and adds, “Never done that before. I…liked it.”

He’s not surprised when Steve’s palm cups his face, but he is delighted. He lets himself be coaxed into meeting Steve’s eyes again, shivering a little at the heat and kindness in them. The little glimpse he’s got of Commander Rogers shows a man well-versed in his power and the ways to wield it, physically and otherwise, but Steve Rogers, the lover, is a heart-wrenching blend of intensity and tenderness. He’s the sort of man a guy could get spoiled on.

And when Steve pulls him into a gentle kiss that Bucky all but melts into, he realizes he wouldn’t mind that at all.

“You’re such a sweet boy,” Steve murmurs against his lips, and Bucky goes warm all over, nearly purring in pleasure. Steve’s hand sinks into his hair, massaging lightly. “Stay here. I’ll get something to clean you up with.”

“Don’t want you to leave.”

That earns him another kiss, deeper this time and still so sweet. By the time they part, Bucky’s heart feels ten sizes too big for his chest.

“Just a second,” Steve promises, gently rubbing the pad of his thumb along the thin, perpetually shadowed skin under Bucky’s eye. “Be right back, Buck.”

Bucky watches him with half-lidded eyes and basks in the afterglow, the world outside temporarily forgotten.

-

It’s nice while it lasts, but that’s the thing, isn’t it? Nothing lasts forever.

The handful of hours he and Steve spent at the cottage is a warm, rose-tinted memory in Bucky’s head. He tucks it away, somewhere deep in his psyche where Nick Fury’s one-eyed glare cannot penetrate.

“You’re saying you got nothing,” Fury says flatly, the lack of inflection a threat in itself.

Bucky shrugs, forces himself to stay relaxed, or as relaxed as he ever is in front of Fury. Hill’s not here today, but then, for all that everyone calls her Fury’s shadow, there aren’t many situations that warrant the simultaneous attention of S.H.I.E.L.D’s Director and Deputy Director. Bucky’s initial encounter with Steve did. His inability to secure any relevant information after his first mission with the Avengers does not.

“I did warn you.” Bucky shrugs. “It’s very clear he doesn’t trust me. Sure, I met Barton and Romanova, but they’re the only Avengers we know anything about, and I doubt that’s coincidence.”

Fury says nothing, just stares at Bucky with his finger steepled in front of his mouth. Bucky sighs, fighting off a guilty conscience. It’s true he didn’t try too hard to sneak around or extract information, but that’s because he’s got more than two braincells to rub together. If he tried to pull anything on that missions, he wouldn’t have found shit, and Steve would have kicked him off the Iron Maiden first chance he got.

That’s not why he’s guilty, but Bucky’s not thinking about that now.

“Listen, Fury, have you ever considered that Commander Rogers agreed to this just to get you off his dick?”

“No, Barnes, that didn’t occur to me at all,” Fury says, tone scorching enough to match a desert at noon. “But yes, do tell me more about Steve Rogers’s dick.”

Bucky grimaces, but at least he doesn’t blush.

“Yes, we fucked again. You can’t tell me you’re surprised. I mean, you’re already half-convinced he’s only doing this to get into my pants.”

Fury’s scowl deepens.

“He picked you up from your house in the middle of the night like he was whisking you off to a high priority covert op, only to stop and take the time to put you through your mattress.” He holds up a hand to halt Bucky’s natural question. “Yes, I listened to the tape because that’s what Agent Malik considers relevant information these days. I should fire the whole lot of you and fuck off to Havana.”

“You’d be bored in half a day, sir,” Bucky says, not bothering to hide his smile.

“Less. Anything else you want to tell me, Barnes?”

Bucky keeps his voice very level when he responds.

“Not really. It’s all in the report. They ditched me after the mission and took off with the prisoners. Then, they came back and handed them over, secured and unconscious. We didn’t talk much, and it was very clear questions on my part wouldn’t be welcome. I contacted you afterwards.”

“We swept through that cottage. Turned every stone. It’s got a digital trail of ownership that our agents can spend a lifetime chasing, but it’s just a fucking cottage.”

“Yeah, I figured. Underground tech caves would be a little too easy, huh?”

“I wish Rogers were as straightforward as Batman. You two fuck again later, Barnes? Because I’d like to have some words with Rogers about the kind of organization he thinks I’m running here.”

Bucky plasters on a lopsided smile and thinks of soiled sheets whisked away, a parting kiss that made his toes curl.

“No, sir. We didn’t.”


	2. stranger in a strange land (running out of time)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s kind, and he’s got the sort of moral certitude that’s damn right unheard of in this business coupled with a stark awareness of the cold reality of this world. The two really shouldn’t mesh so well, should leave a man disillusioned or downright insane, but Steve’s as sane as they come, and there’s something about him that makes you want to _believe_ , not in truth or justice or God or America, just him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has a bit of **non-linear storytelling** , but it’s a couple of sex scenes scattered in between the plotty plot and pretty easy to spot.
> 
> There’s completely linear porn too because let’s face it, sex is almost all I write.

By the time Bucky settles semi-comfortably into his newly-minted role as S.H.I.E.L.D’s liaison to the Avengers – well, that’s what they call it, but so far, the reality of it is that he’s extra muscle slash extra firepower that they probably don’t need – he has resigned himself to the guilt that’s besieging him from both fronts.

Ironically enough, it’s after Fury calms down from his initial frenzy for information and Steve’s eyes on him after missions become less calculating and more welcoming that it gets worse. Both of Bucky’s current masters are inscrutable fucks with agendas dripping out their assholes, but Fury has taken to treating Bucky’s involvement with the Avengers and specifically Steve as a sort of long-term, not-really-but-kinda-undercover mission, and while Steve hasn’t said anything about trust since that first mission, his actions speak loud enough. He doesn’t kick Bucky off the Iron Maiden after missions anymore, and though he hasn’t been taken to anything resembling the Avengers’ base of operations, he has been exposed to a few weapon caches and one of Barton’s safe houses.

He has fond memories of that safe house.

They always drop him off at the cottage in the end, and usually, Steve stays a while. It’s nice.

Bucky faithfully passed these locations over to S.H.I.E.L.D, albeit with strict instructions not to act on them and blow his mission, and each time, his conscience whined at him with the sort of insistence he hasn’t felt since he was a baby agent flailing in the world of espionage.

It would be one thing if he’s judging himself only for doing his job. But no, holding back is apparently equally criminal in the Court of Barnes that resides in his fucking head. He tries to justify it to himself, usually on long nights where sleep evades him and all he can do is lie in bed and think about what he’s done, or not done as it stands. He still hasn’t met any of the Avengers except Romanova and Barton, he doesn’t know where their considerable funding originates from, and he’s nowhere close to even seeing the others, let alone unmasking them; framed like that, a few locations not particularly relevant to Fury’s purposes are all he can reasonably give S.H.I.E.L.D.

But that overlooks Barton’s calculated but nonetheless warm and friendly overtures at conversation, which Bucky takes up and always finds himself glad about. Barton’s a cool guy; his S.H.I.E.L.D file is mostly on his ability and the parts that focus on character are concerned only with how he is as an agent. Outside of the mission, he’s the kind of uncoordinated disaster who makes you question how a man like that manages to regularly scale high-rises without breaking every bone in his body. It’s strangely endearing, enough so that Bucky regrets never crossing paths with Barton in the two years their time at S.H.I.E.L.D overlapped.

Romanova is a whole other beast. She doesn’t trust him, and she doesn’t bother hiding that she doesn’t trust him. The way she goes about it, Bucky gets the impression that she downright relishes the chance to be so blatant in her wariness. He’s caught Steve staring at her during such times with a wide, fond smile that makes sure to vanish before she can catch him at it, not that that stops her from narrowing her eyes at him and swearing under her breath in Russian. She’s curt and polite in English but crass and colorful once she’s letting loose in her mother tongue, and one of these days, Bucky’s gonna tell her in the middle of one of her murmured rants that he’s fluent in Russian, just to see her expression.

And then there’s Steve, and god, where does Bucky start with him?

In a way, there’s not much to say. He’s the same entrancing man Bucky met that time he was captured, and that alone is a hell of a thing, knowing there was no artifice in Steve throughout that affair, no front plastered on to deal with a prisoner. He’s kind, and he’s got the sort of moral certitude that’s damn right unheard of in this business coupled with a stark awareness of the cold reality of this world. The two really shouldn’t mesh so well, should leave a man disillusioned or downright insane, but Steve’s as sane as they come, and there’s something about him that makes you want to believe, not in truth or justice or God or America, just him.

Bucky adores him. It’s terrible.

He’s not the only one. That much is immediately clear. Barton looks at him with hearts in his eyes. Romanova doesn’t give anything away easy, but even her face softens when they alight on her Commander.

These are things that don’t make it into mission reports. They’re not the only ones.

-

“Nick gave me a very stern talking to,” Steve tells him after their second mission together.

Bucky rears up with a wet sound and wipes his mouth absently before saying, “You wanna talk about Fury with my mouth around your dick? Seriously?”

Steve, leaning against the wall of the cottage that’s apparently their post-mission Bucky Disposal Center, bestows him with an angelic smile. One of his hands is curved loosely around the back of Bucky’s head, and before he can utter another word, it tightens its grip and shoves him forward onto the cock he just abandoned.

Bucky opens up for it with a little moan he can’t stifle. He’s only been dying to suck Steve’s dick since he first saw it, and he’s not going to let Steve’s ignorance of appropriate timing stop him. He takes it halfway and has to pause, struggling with the gag reflex that refuses to leave him alone. He wins the fight and takes Steve in deep, till the thick head is pushing wetly down his throat. Bucky squeezes his eyes shut and shudders, hands flexing on Steve’s hips, gripping hard enough to leave bruises that will fade by the time they clean up.

“Kid,” Steve calls softly, fondly, from above him. Bucky manages to pry his eyes open and look at him. “Look so pretty down there, Buck.”

Bucky whines around Steve, and it must feel damn good for him, judging by his low groan and the tightening of his fingers in Bucky’s hair. Bucky shifts around like that will give some relief to his aching cock, trapped in his pants. Then Steve’s well and truly gripping him by the hair and pulling him off his cock, and Bucky forgets to do anything that’s not going where he’s led.

Steve doesn’t let up until his cockhead is barely brushing Bucky’s mouth. He flicks his tongue out, teasingly running it along the slit, and is rewarded by the sound of Steve cursing, voice shot through with need.

“Behave,” he grits out, yanking Bucky’s head back until he can feel the strain in his throat. He whimpers, mouth falling open. “Christ, look at you. You want it bad.”

“Yes,” Bucky gasps out, desperate and literally fucking panting for it.

“Gonna fuck your mouth, Buck. That alright?”

Bucky shivers all over and nods as best as he can, groaning when it makes his scalp sting. Steve doesn’t ease up on his grip, but he does let Bucky’s head fall forward, though only to nudge his mouth open with his cock and feed him the length of it. Bucky sucks him down gratefully, moaning again at the heat and weight of it on his tongue. Steve doesn’t stop at the telltale resistance at Bucky’s throat, just keep on pushing past as he struggles not to gag. He scores angry red groves down Steve’s thighs, but he takes it too, throat opening up for every fucking inch of it.

He blinks away his tears, nose buried in Steve’s pubic hair, drowning in the heavy musk of it. He could stay here forever, mouth and throat open for Steve, the whole of Bucky an instrument for his pleasure.

It’s even better when Steve starts to fuck his throat in earnest, the thrusts almost gentle at first and then not at all, driving into his mouth with growing vigor. Bucky doesn’t have to do anything but let Steve move him like a puppet, mouth moved up and down his cock and held still for him to fuck into. Bucky closes his eyes, tears still dripping down his cheeks, and gives himself over to the hand in his hair and the cock in his mouth.

He doesn’t register it, at first, and by the time he’s swallowing around the gush of heat down his throat, Steve’s starting to soften. He stays in Bucky’s mouth for a few moments after, letting him suckle gently until Steve has to pull back with a hiss.

“Fuck,” Steve sighs, and when Bucky looks up at him, he almost melts under Steve’s pleased, _proud_ gaze. “You were made for that, kid.”

Bucky smiles dopily at him, the praise curling over his heart and sizzling down his spine.

“Come up here,” Steve orders. “Let me get a look at you.”

Bucky’s stumbling upright before Steve’s even finished speaking, steadied by one hand in his hair and another on his arm. Steve pulls him hard against his body and lets Bucky just cling to him as they kiss. Steve licks into his mouth like he’s starving for the taste of himself on Bucky’s tongue. Bucky manages to kiss back at first, panting and clumsy, but then Steve’s deftly undoing his fly and reaching for his cock, and Bucky’s lost at the very first touch.

He winds up just moaning open-mouthed into the kiss as Steve jerks him off with swift, sure strokes, sending Bucky crashing towards his climax.

When the stars have cleared from his vision, there’s a mess on both their suits and he’s being kept upright only by Steve’s grip on him.

“Jesus,” Bucky says, still dazed, and Steve hums as if in agreement.

Bucky tries to stand on his own power and mostly succeeds, only to have his knees knocked out from under him by the sight of Steve bringing his come-stained hand to his lips for a taste. He collapses right back against Steve’s chest. It rumbles under him with laughter. Bucky refuses to even feel embarrassed because he’s sure it’ll take men far stronger than him to withstand the sight of Steve Rogers with come on his star-stamped suit and licking at his fingers for a taste of Bucky.

“Should I carry you to bed?” Steve asks, nuzzling at Bucky’s temple.

“I wouldn’t mind,” Bucky returns, leaning a little more on Steve.

He gets his wish a second later, swept easily into a bridal carry like he’s not a couple hundred pounds of muscle and metal. He muffles an undignified squeak and clings for life to Steve’s shoulders but gets distracted all too soon by them, broad and strong and perfect for Bucky to throw his legs over.

He tells Steve as much and is tilted into a kiss that makes his head spin.

He’s as disappointed as he’s relieved to make it into bed without his brain melting out of his ears. Steve joins him without even bothering to strip, and they’re both a little gross, but Bucky’s all too glad to just cuddle with him in what little time they have before Steve has to return to his team and Bucky has to go give his report to Fury. He’s not looking forward to it; the mission was another quick clean-up, a militant neo-Nazi cell this time, though not the kind that tried to hail Hydra. They left the assholes tied up for local police to deal with, and whatever the Avengers came for, it was found in their computers, which Bucky didn’t even get close to. He’s got nothing for Fury.

Somehow, Bucky doubts he’ll be much interested in the taste of Steve’s dick.

He snorts, thinking of how he’d even put that in a report, and Steve shifts against him.

“What’s so funny, kid?”

“Nah, nothing, just thinking of Fury’s reaction if – oh, wait. What did he chew you out for?”

Steve pulls back from where he was happily faceplanted in Bucky’s hair and says, “Guess.”

Bucky pouts. It makes Steve’s eyes go dark with interest but doesn’t get him an answer.

“Alright, fine.” He stops a moment to think, and the answer’s pretty obvious when he’s not preoccupied by the dick in his mouth. “Oh. Right. Me. He said something like that, but I didn’t think he’d get on your case about it. Sorry, Steve.”

Steve frowns.

“What for? I’m in this as much as you are, Bucky. And Fury’s approval or disapproval doesn’t mean shit to me, you realize.” He pauses, frown growing more pronounced. “Will it cause trouble for you?”

“Nah.” Bucky leans in for a kiss, something warm bubbling up in him when he gets one easily, Steve’s mouth warm and sweet on his. “He’ll bitch about it, but it’s Fury. He’ll bitch about everything. He’s not worried about me being compromised.”

The moment he says that, Bucky freezes.

If Steve notices – and he must, has to, with how he’s pressed all along Bucky – he doesn’t say anything. He kisses Bucky instead, deeper this time, swiping lazily at his lips until he opens up and then sucking at his tongue until Bucky’s a happy puddle again.

“Let me know if that changes,” he says when they pull back, and Bucky doesn’t ask if he’s talking about Fury or Bucky.

-

“Is – this a – a – _fuck_ – post-mission – ah, _ah_ –”

“Hm?” Steve asks, graciously giving Bucky a momentary break from being railed through the wall.

“Ritual,” Bucky gasps, squirming against Steve and on his cock to try and get him to move. He barely has any leverage, held up by Steve’s huge arms and pressed against the wall, but he tries. Steve doesn’t budge, only narrows his eyes at Bucky in a clear order. Bucky gives up and voices his question. “Is this a post-mission ritual now? Us fucking?”

Steve barely blinks before resuming the relentless thrust of his hips.

“I suppose,” he says, somehow making himself heard over the sound of Bucky’s wailing. “It’s my favorite, as far as post-mission anything goes. Pretty little boy like you, who’d resist, hm?”

Bucky whines, face burning from the sudden blush, and hides his face in Steve’s neck. He’s allowed the respite for all of a minute before Steve’s winding those long fingers into his hair and yanking his head back. Bucky keeps his eyes shut, hiding in spite of himself.

“Open your eyes, kid,” Steve orders and when Bucky doesn’t obey, what he gets is – is _nothing_ , Steve stilling just like that, cock buried to the hilt in Bucky and not moving an inch. His pathetic whine only gets him an unimpressed tsk. “Bucky. Open your eyes.”

He does, blinking until Steve’s face is clear, the blue of his eyes just a ring around blown pupils. The way he’s looking at Bucky makes him feel small and cornered, a rabbit at the feet of a lion.

“Keep ‘em open,” is all Steve says before continuing to fuck Bucky’s brains out.

A few minutes in, and he’s trembling, hands sliding hungrily over Steve’s bare skin. Hard to believe, even now, that he gets to have this man like this, naked and glorious and intent on ruining Bucky for anyone else.

“Can I – can I – sir, please, lemme–”

“What is it?” Steve says, adjusting his grip on Bucky and plowing into him at a new angle, his thrusts shallower and sharper and nailing the prostate each fucking time. Bucky promptly loses the ability to speak, crying out loud with each stroke. “C’mon, son. Use your words.”

 _Bastard_ , Bucky thinks, fond and furious, mostly the former.

Steve grins like he can hear him thinking, the expression hard and smug. It goes straight to Bucky’s dick, hard and wet between their bodies.

“Let me touch,” Bucky manages to gasp, digging his nails into Steve’s biceps like that will earn him some composure. “Touch myself, touch my cock, please, I need it, sir.”

“Aw, sweetheart,” Steve croons, pressing kisses all along Bucky’s face. The one on his mouth is rough, biting, and Bucky tastes blood when he tries to chase Steve’s lips. “Go on. All you had to do was ask.”

Bucky’s answer is lost in a moan that Steve drinks right from his mouth. He strokes himself frantically, all rhythm gone as he’s bounced mercilessly on Steve’s cock. It doesn’t take much for him to come, just a few strokes and the sharp sting of Steve’s teeth sinking into his lower lip.

Steve fucks him through it, not slowing down, and picks up speed once Bucky’s spent and limp in his grip. He moans through it all, egging Steve on with incoherent pleas until he comes inside Bucky and keeps fucking coming, wetting him all up inside.

Bucky lets out a strangled noise when Steve slips out of him and comes gushes out in his wake. It’s a hell of a feeling, the startling heat of it on his sore, swollen hole, and one Bucky’s still not used to. It makes him shiver and clench his gut, shuddering with arousal that makes his soft cock ache.

Steve slowly unwinds Bucky’s legs from around his hips and sets them down, keeping Bucky upright until he can more or less stand on his own. He keeps clinging to Steve anyway, because he can and because he knows Steve doesn’t mind. Likes it, in fact, seeing and knowing how thoroughly fucked-out Bucky is. And Bucky likes that he likes it; likes even more that they’ve done this often enough to learn these things about each other.

“Think Barton will mind that we fucked in here?’

‘Here’ is a closet-sized bedroom, barely big enough for a double bed and a table beside it. With Steve, mountain-sized, and Bucky, not Steve-sized but still a big man, standing in the available foot space, it seems even smaller than it is.

“It’s a safe house, not the home he built with his own two hands,” Steve answers, smiling like he knows something Bucky doesn’t. “Clint won’t care. I’m pretty sure this place has seen worse anyway.”

“That’s not very reassuring, Steve,” Bucky says. He gets a wink is response and has no excuse for how even that makes his knees weak.

“I’ll go shower and change,” Steve says, kissing him fast on the mouth. Bucky sighs when he pulls away, and Steve brushes another kiss along his temple. “You rest. Be good.”

He leaves Bucky alone in the room with a final pat to his cheek, fond but the kind of thing you’d give a favored pet. It’s fucking deliberate, _everything_ about Steve is deliberate, and Bucky barely manages to wobble the three feet to the bed before collapsing bodily on it. But even fucked-out as he is, the part of him that’s agent first and person second is cataloguing the ways he can snoop around in the little time he’ll have while Steve’s in the bathroom. It won’t be much, and he’ll have to be very quiet, but he can manage something, probably.

But–

Steve told him to be good. And spying around in his teammate’s safe house, one that Bucky’s allowed to be in as a sign of burgeoning trust, isn’t being _good_. Doesn’t matter that he might not find anything useful or anything at all. It’s the act of it. The choice.

Bucky makes himself relax into his sprawl, surprised to find that despite the battle in his mind, his body’s all too happy to bask in being boneless and wrung out.

In the end, he just lies there staring at the ceiling until door opens and Steve comes in, hair wet and half-naked, not quite taking the choice away as much as allowing Bucky the illusion that he doesn’t have to make one.

“I’ve been good,” he says with a smile that comes all too easy. “What’s my reward, sir?”

Steve laughs, a startled little bark, but the wide slash of his mouth settles into a sweeter curl as he meets Bucky’s gaze. He looks delighted, laughter lines standing prominent in his usually serious face.

Bucky can spend hours just looking at him, tracing the dips and curves of his face with reverent fingers, and god, he’s in trouble.

-

His mission reports don’t hold any of this. Their stark, unfeeling lines never could.

-

Four months and seven missions later, Bucky still doesn’t know anything vital about the Avengers. But he knows that shocked, borderline obscene sound Steve makes when Bucky uses his metal palm to dig just right into the persistent knot near the small of his back. He knows Clint – _for fuck’s sake, man, you’ve killed a guy for me, you can use my first name_ – has a taste for pizza that borders on obsessive and a dog that’s as bad as he is. He knows that the vibrant red Romanova sported on their fifth mission together really is her natural coloring, and that it’s information he better be privileged to have, however accidental its acquisition; her words, not his, but he feels their truth anyway.

He knows the Avengers are a family, the ones he’s met and the ones he’s hoping he never will, because maybe Fury doesn’t have destructive intentions towards them, but Bucky’s worked for S.H.I.E.L.D too long to believe in its goodwill.

For the first time, he finds himself glad to be entangled in a mission that’s sure to end in failure.

His missions with the Avengers have all been, as Bucky described it that first time, milk runs. AIM cells, neo-Nazis, drug smugglers, ISIS – Bucky takes them out from high up above for the most part, Steve’s voice rumbling in his ear as he directs Bucky and authorizes lethal force as needed. Twice, he was on the ground. One was a two-man run with Romanova, and the second was a brief undercover stint with Barton, the two of them posing as a newlywed couple. The most a mission has lasted is three days. He still hasn’t met another Avenger. Steve has yet to fight with them, but he did spar with Bucky once while Romanova looked on and kindly made herself scarce when Bucky started panting for reasons that had nothing to do with being slammed on the mat four times in a row.

It’s surprisingly fun. A great team, a great commander; too good to last.

And it doesn’t.

-

“Ant-man and Wasp will be joining us tomorrow,” Steve tells him over breakfast. Bucky woke up too early to sounds in his kitchen and a sight no mortal should be made to bear; Steve Rogers in an apron, making pancakes in his kitchen. It took him a whole ten minutes to notice the device placed innocuously on his dining table, small and silver with dotted circles that flashed blue every so often.

“Disrupts the bugs,” Steve told him when he asked. “Can’t have Fury knowing how hopeless I am with batter.”

Sure enough, the pancakes are a bit too lumpy and burned to boot. Bucky will eat _all of them_.

It’s only his determination to show appreciation for Steve’s lackluster cooking that keeps Bucky chewing even after those words and all that they imply hit him like a freight train.

“Oh.” He swallows the soggy lump in his mouth. “Big mission?”

“Hydra,” Steve says simply.

“ _Oh_. Well, fuck.”

Steve gives him a faint smile and pushes the tray of pancakes towards him. Bucky wordless takes another two and drowns them in syrup because overwhelming affection for Steve might make him happily eat the things, but he’s not above admitting they they’re unbearable without syrup.

But pancakes can only distract him for so long.

Hydra’s been a thorn on pretty much everyone’s side since they proved in spectacular fashion that they weren’t dead and gone as everyone hoped, sometime after Steve’s vanishing act and presumed death. Given that this took the form of a hostile takeover attempt from within S.H.I.E.L.D itself, the people concerned – which thankfully did not involve the general public – were understandably rattled, regardless of how Director Cater sent her would-be assassins to their gory deaths and did some impressive house-cleaning afterwards.

But cut off one head, you get two more, usually more rabid than their severed precursors. It’s not overly complicated, usually, but it is always a pain.

At the moment though, Bucky’s more concerned about Ant-man and Wasp.

“You sure you want me on this mission, Steve?”

He doesn’t look up from his pancakes as he asks. But he can feel the weight of Steve’s eyes on him, and he resists as long as he can, which really isn’t all that long because this man makes him so weak. When he looks up, Steve’s peering calmly at him, nibbling at the burnt edge of a pancake.

“You’re more than capable, Buck.”

This time, Bucky makes himself hold Steve’s gaze when he speaks.

“That’s not what I’m asking and you know it.”

“Trust is a fickle thing for people like us,” Steve says immediately, like he was expecting this. “Hard to earn. Easy to lose. And lost once, it’s lost forever.”

Bucky’s heart is pounding so loud that he’s scared Steve can hear it. He doesn’t dare open his mouth, scared of what might slip out.

Would it be so bad though?

“There’s this kid in my team,” Steve says, the sudden non-sequitur making Bucky blink in confusion. “She’s been through a lot, and for a long time, she had to be strong and ruthless, just to survive. Because it wasn’t just her. She had a brother to care for. And she couldn’t shake that mentality after they joined us, no matter how safe it seemed. She wouldn’t sleep for days at a time. Couldn’t. The first time she fell asleep instead of dropping from exhaustion was when I stayed on the floor near her bed and promised to watch over her and her brother both. I’ve never been a very paternal man. Never imagined having kids and a white picket fence. But watching her sleep that night – I would commit atrocities, Bucky, to keep that girl safe. To keep my team safe. Do you understand?”

Bucky nods, throat tight around a shapeless mass of words.

“I know,” he manages after several seconds, spellbound by the smoldering embers in Steve’s eyes, a roaring fire held in check. “They’re – they’re your family.”

“They are,” Steve agrees easily. “So you have to understand that this isn’t a decision I made lightly or without thought. Certainly not with my dick.”

Bucky snorts, shocked into it. Steve watches him with pleased, patient eyes.

“Join the mission tomorrow, Buck.”

The human mind is a wonderful, terrible thing. It can make you feel light as a feather and heavy as a sinking stone, all the same time. Pride and guilt, warring mercilessly.

But there’s only one answer he can give, that he wants to give.

“Yes, Steve.”

-

“I’m Sc – ow, _ow_ , Ant-man, I’m Ant-man, hi,” one of the masked duo says, hiding neither his slip nor his reaction to his partner’s hand digging hard into his shoulder.

“And I’m Wasp,” says said partner, her voice calm and containing none of Ant-man’s frenetic energy.

“Winter Soldier,” Bucky says, keeping in with the theme. Technically, his codename’s Ghost, but after the spectacularly dubious life decision that got him a metal arm, half-metal spine, and ports in his fucking brain, he’s kind of embraced the title of the program he survived.

“Nice to meet you, man,” Ant-man chirps, voice still high and excited. “Heard about you, a _lot_ about you, nice arm, _very_ cool.”

Bucky carefully extracts said _very cool_ arm from a somewhat overenthusiastic handshake and subtly edges back an inch. From behind the masked duo, Clint is openly snickering at him. Even Romanova looks amused. Wasp’s eyes are narrowed at him through her yellow face-plate, but he can’t read what they hold.

“You too,” Bucky says faintly, stepping back a bit more obviously towards the safety of the cockpit. He points a thumb wildly over his shoulder towards where Steve is. “Imma just…go.”

He goes.

Steve looks up at him, eyebrow inching higher when Bucky slams the button to make the door slide shut.

“You alright there, Buck?”

“You left me there,” Bucky snaps accusatorily, collapsing gracelessly on the co-pilot’s seat. “With the – the new people.”

Steve only looks more amused.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you needed me to hold your hand like it’s the first day of kindergarten.”

“Fuck you, I marched right into kindergarten like a goddamn soldier.” He could leave it at that, and Bucky really has no idea why he adds, “I was mad because mum said she’d be there but wasn’t. Couldn’t get leave, y’know. And dad wasn’t really the hand-holding type. Wasn’t the anything type, really. Think he used up any love he had for kids carrying me and my sister through term.”

When Steve reaches for his hand, Bucky doesn’t pull away like he half-wants to. He doesn’t really want to anyway. Just thinks he should. Don’t show weakness, don’t draw comfort.

Steve’s hand dwarfs his own, long fingers and wide palm eating it right up. Bucky stares at it, watching his fingers curl shyly over Steve’s.

“You two talk these days?”

Bucky looks up sharply. There’s no judgement in Steve’s face, just open eyes and gentle invitation.

“No. Rebecca does, but she and I don’t talk much these days either. You know who she is, don’t you? Rebecca?”

“Twin sister. It was in your file.”

Bucky chuckles, and the sound’s ugly, but he’s amused in a dark sort of way.

“No privacy in this business.” He looks at Steve and adds, “Do I pass the compulsory dark past test?”

“That’s morbid. Strangely true though, isn’t it?”

“Well, I imagine well-adjusted people with loving families and good jobs won’t sign up to kill people and blow shit up for a living.”

“Fair enough. We do more than that though. You do more than that.”

“Yeah? Like what?”

“You save people.”

Bucky turns away. Looks out at the sky, pale blue with wispy clouds scattered through.

“Not enough of them.”

“Can’t save everyone.”

Bucky squeezes Steve’s hand, and he returns the pressure. And then he tugs, and Bucky lets himself be gently coaxed into Steve’s lap. It’s still a rush, a thrill that shivers up his spine, how he can curl up on Steve and be utterly enveloped in the warmth of him.

“Why are we talking about this again?” he asks Steve’s neck, rubbing his face a little against his fuzzy beard. Steve makes a pleased sound and cups Bucky around the back of his head.

“Don’t know. But I think you came in here trying to escape Ant-man.”

“Oh, yeah. Save me.”

“He can be a lot, especially when he’s nervous. But he’s a good man. And Wasp keeps him grounded most of the time.”

“No, no, he seems nice and all. I just can’t people right now.”

“You nervous too, Buck?” Steve asks, running a soothing palm up and down Bucky’s spine, warm and sure even through Bucky’s tac gear. It’s hard not to melt under that loving attention, hard to hold onto all the tension. Bucky tries anyway because he can’t let himself forget what’s at stake here.

“I’m fine,” Bucky lies, pushing his face deeper into Steve’s neck like he’s trying to crawl into his skin.

Steve says nothing, just strokes Bucky like a cat, slowly but surely kneading the tension out of his stubborn muscles.

-

The mission goes off without a hitch.

Afterwards – not so much.

Everything seems alright at first. Sure, Bucky can’t stop thinking about how Ant-man and Wasp _shrunk_ , how she easily carried him as the two them buzzed between unaware Hydra goons while the rest of the team plowed through them the old-fashioned way. It’s easy to see why Steve wanted those two on this mission; by the time Bucky, Clint, and Romanova returned to the Iron Maiden, the two of them were already there, Wasp perched casually stop a huge container of the strange, blue-hued energy weapons Steve sent them to retrieve.

A part of Bucky can’t stop thinking how to word all of it in his report.

Another part is going over how to omit the same without rousing suspicions. 

He keeps out of the cockpit because he doesn’t trust himself not to either blurt everything to Steve or try and sit on his dick. He’s looking desperately forward to being dumped like yesterday’s vegetable stock in the cottage he’s come to semi-fondly call his and Steve’s love nest. Sex with Steve is guaranteed to shut his brain down, and usually, he can float in the afterglow all the way to his apartment and into his bed for hours of sound sleep.

But the world is set against him.

When they touch down, Ant-man and Wasp stroll right out, which is the first warning.

The second is less a warning and more a punch to the face. Bucky’s speechless as he stares out at the sprawling but drab concrete slab of a building situated soundly in the middle of nowhere.

“Where the fuck is this?”

“Base 3.” It’s Romanova who answers, stepping into place beside Bucky, far closer than she usually stands. “You’ve been here before. I carried you some. You’re very heavy.”

“It’s the metal,” he says absently, mind roiling with the implications.

He remembers that plain but comfortable room. Friday projecting books on the wall. Riding Steve on the bed.

A hand clamps around his right bicep, no metal there to protect him from the sharp sting of pointed nails.

“Come,” Romanova says, with a smile that’s too much a knife and a tone that brooks no protest. “You have blood on you. I’ll show you the showers.”

He does have blood on him. He doesn’t think that’s why she’s doing this.

“I–”

He casts a glance backwards at the cockpit, but the door is closed, and Steve doesn’t magically emerge to save Bucky. He contemplates pulling away and refusing to leave the jet. It wouldn’t make much of a scene with just Romanova and Steve here. And Steve would understand, but then he’d also know, and Bucky can’t – he can’t take that. He can’t disappoint Steve. He doesn’t want to.

In the end, it’s that which decides him. That and the fact that he and Romanova have worked together for months now, fighting and killing together, protecting each other. He wouldn’t say they’re friends. What he feels for her is mostly professional respect and no small amount of curiosity, but she’s no longer a codename stamped across a page with the names of the dead underneath. She’s not the Black Widow, she’s Natasha Romanova, and if she wanted him dead, he’d never see her coming.

He lets her lead him into the building.

The security, at first, seems lacking. They walk right in through the front door and into an elevator that, predictably, goes underground. But he does notice that there are no buttons inside, and that the elevator seems to be moving on its own.

Romanova sees him looking and says, “Friday is monitoring everything. She’ll take us where we need to go.”

“Oh. I remember her. Kinda. We never met. She your tech expert or something?”

Romanova’s smile is small but genuinely amused.

“Or something.”

The doors open before Bucky can pry, right into a familiar gunmetal grey corridor he still sees in his dreams sometimes. He groans, and Romanova chuckles like she finds his pain greatly entertaining, the asshole.

“My eyes hurt,” he complains anyway, following her out into the hall.

“You poor baby,” she mocks sweetly. “Ask Steve to kiss them better.”

She laughs when Bucky sputters and almost trips over his feet, and he stops, staring. He’s never seen her laugh before. Smile, yes, smirk, _oh_ yes, but this is full-bodied, throaty laughter, and it strikes him, that moment, that she’s easily the most gorgeous woman he’s ever seen.

And he feels oddly proud for causing her to laugh like that, and oh fuck, this is a hell of a time to realize he’s as genuinely fond of Romanova, with her casual intimidation tactics and ruthless efficiency, as he is of Clint.

“Hey, can I call you Natasha?” he asks, because bad timing or not, he might as well commit.

She blinks and levels him with a long, assessing stare. Then she nods, once.

“As you like, James.”

“C’mon, you know it’s Bucky.”

“I killed an English orthodontist with a dog named Bucky once,” is all she says on the matter.

-

Natasha leads him to what turns out to be a room considerably larger than the one he was given last time. The bed’s bigger and made up neatly, and there are a couple of paintings framed on the walls which, unfortunately, remain a drab grey.

“Go on,” she says, nudging Bucky towards the wall to his right. As if on cue, a portion of it opens up, revealing a blindingly white interior.

“Are you seriously gonna stay here until I go in there?”

“Yes.”

“ _Why?_ ”

Natasha smirks at him.

It widens when Bucky takes a whiff of his underarms and grimaces at the pretty typical but still unpleasant reek of sweat. It’s a wonder to him that he’s content to all but shove his nose into Steve’s armpits and breathe in his scent no matter how rank, only to always cringe at his own body odor. Humans are really fucking weird.

“Fine, but I’m not giving you a show,” he says, marching towards the bathroom.

Before the door closes behind him, he hears her mutter, “You greatly overestimate your appeal,” and it makes him grin in spite of himself.

He manages to be calm and cool and composed until he’s naked under the hot, soothing spray. It’s as he’s watching blood not his own be washed off the white tiles that the reality of the situation hits him square in the chest.

The Avengers trust him.

Not completely. Maybe not even halfway to completely. But they could get there, with time, as long as Bucky bides his time and plays his part right. And he’s done this long enough, _been_ this long enough, that it’s so easy to imagine what he has to do to see his mission through.

Feed Fury carefully curated information with the promise of more. Love Steve Rogers with his body and what he can spare of his heart. Be the weapon the metal in his bones made him into.

All he has to do is be himself, do what he’s been doing. He can play the double agent, if he wants to take it further. Pretend to abandon S.H.I.E.L.D and pledge loyalty to Steve, and it would be no hardship being convincing because Steve’s the kind of man strangers would lay down their lives for. Bucky could do it; a colder man than him might emerge from it unscathed too. He won’t, but he will emerge nonetheless. He has, before.

But the mob bosses and assassin-spies of before, though charming and charismatic and tempting in ways that defy words, weren’t _Steve Rogers_.

They weren’t good and kind and stunningly capable like Steve. They didn’t make Bucky’s stomach flip and heart flutter like Steve.

God, he doesn’t want to–

It’s testament to his preoccupation that he doesn’t notice he’s not alone until a hand winds itself around his waist.

It’s testament to how familiar he is with Steve’s body that he instinctively relaxes into the broad chest pressing up against his back.

“Fancy seeing you here,” Steve says, rubbing his big dumb face all over Bucky’s neck. His beard catches enticingly against Bucky’s own slight stubble. He tips his throat back, moaning shamelessly when Steve’s hands slide appreciatively down his wet skin.

“That’s my line,” he says once he’s got his breath back. “You go around ambushing boys in the shower, sir? Like some old pervert on the prowl for pretty young things.”

“Pretty young thing,” Steve echoes, voice deep and considering. “That what you are, Buck?”

“Ain’t I?” Bucky would flutter his lashes, but he can’t bring himself to open them. He can feel it already, how his mind’s going quiet and blank the way it does when Steve’s around, emptied of everything except the taste and smell and feel of him.

“’Course you are, kid. My pretty young thing. For the record though – these are my quarters.”

Bucky’s surprised at that, at least for a moment, before he remembers Natasha’s smirk and facepalms.

“Of course it is,” he says petulantly. “Natasha led me here. Said I stink.”

Steve nuzzles against Bucky’s throat like he’s trying to drag out the stench Bucky spent the last ten minutes scrubbing away.

“Pity,” Steve says, all rumbly like he gets when he’s got Bucky where he wants him and is about to do unholy things to him. “I like your stink.”

“Old pervert,” Bucky says, blushing despite the similar line of his own thoughts not too long ago.

“Your old pervert,” Steve says like that makes all the difference, and–

It does. It really does.

Bucky goes easily when he’s turned around, lurching eagerly but unsteadily into the messy, open-mouthed kiss Steve drags him into. His big brain sizzles and melts within seconds, leaving the little one to take the reins. And it does, bobbing needily against his stomach as he squirms against Steve’s body, trying to stealthily grind against his thigh.

Steve catches him at it, huffing a laugh against Bucky’s mouth before pulling back to frown at him, fond admonishment in the furrow of his brows and the stern line of his lips.

“Behave.”

“But, sir,” Bucky whines, peering up at Steve in that way he knows makes him look all sweet and vulnerable and gets Steve hot in return. His old pervert.

“Sweetheart,” Steve murmurs, crowding Bucky against the wall. He shivers when his back touches the cool tile. “Tell me what you want.”

“You.” The answer slips out of its own volition, and the truth of it makes Bucky tremble. He says it again anyway, reverent. “Just you.”

Steve’s eyes widen, then darken, his expression settling into something pleased and possessive.

He slides to his knees with preternatural grace. It’s only when he’s looking up at Bucky with dark intent in his eyes that Bucky realizes the shower stopped at some point without him registering when or how.

And then Steve’s pressing his mouth to Bucky’s cock, and the shower’s the least of his concerns.

“St- _eve_.”

The high-pitched shout echoes around the bathroom, but Steve only blinks innocently up at him like he didn’t just swallow the whole of Bucky’s dick without warning. Bucky reaches down with a shaking hand to touch Steve’s face, his hollowed cheeks and wrinkled forehead. It’s too much all of a sudden, and Bucky throws his head back, squeezing his eyes shut.

Steve fucking hums around his cock and starts pulling off, hands tight on Bucky’s hips to keep him from trying to chase his mouth. Not that he’s all that likely to try; it’s been all too easy to get used to letting Steve control his movements, and sometimes, his body remembers even when his mind forgets.

“Bucky.” Steve’s mouth is close enough for his breath to fall hot on the head of Bucky’s cock. And his tone is a familiar thing, coaxing and warning all at once. “Look at me, kid.”

Bucky would resist, not long but a little more, just to get Steve huffing and determined to bend Bucky to his will. But this time, each soft exhalation against his dick reminds him what he’s missing out here, and Bucky gives it up just like that, looking down at Steve with half-lidded eyes and a pout.

“There’s a sight,” Steve says, making Bucky’s insides squirm. “Eyes on me.”

As if Bucky hasn’t been helpless not to do precisely that since he first saw this man.

He’s seen Steve sexed up in so many ways already – deep inside Bucky and grunting with each thrust, grinding hard and dirty against him with a downright evil grin, murmuring sweet nonsense while worshipping his way down Bucky’s body – and none of it prepares him for this; Steve with his mouth stretched tight around Bucky’s cock and sucking it down like he’ll die without it.

Bucky doesn’t realize he’s moaning Steve’s name until the endless litany of _stevestevestevestevesteve_ echoes off bathroom walls and falls back on his ears, distorted in the closed space. He doesn’t stop, can’t, held in place by Steve’s hand and driven out of his skin by Steve’s mouth.

Steve eases off to mouth at the head, doing something with his tongue that tears a shout out of Bucky. The smug grin he throws Bucky goes right to his gut too because he’s half in love with an _asshole_ and apparently likes it that way.

Then Steve’s swallowing him back down with twice the vigor of before, and Bucky lasts a blissful ten seconds before he’s spilling with a cry down Steve’s throat. Steve works his mouth gently around Bucky until he’s wrung dry and gasping from oversensitivity. And then he sucks a little more, just to see tears roll down Bucky’s cheeks and hear the desperate pitch of his cries.

“ _Please_ , c’mon, _off_ , please, please,” Bucky gasps, never above begging, and Steve finally pulls off, taking his sweet time letting Bucky’s cock slide out of his mouth.

“One day,” Steve says, sounding exactly like he just had a dick down his throat, “I’m gonna suck you off and keep sucking until you’re hard again. How about that, son?”

“Okay,” Bucky agrees dazedly. “I’ll die. But okay.”

Steve’s smiling when he rises, and his mouth tastes like come when he kisses Bucky. The taste sinks like a hook into his gut, pulling viciously until he’s licking into Steve’s mouth, desperate for it. Long fingers curl gently over his jaw, but all it takes is the suggestion of force to make Bucky lean back, though not without a final flick of his tongue against Steve’s curved lips.

“So it takes my mouth on your cock to make you scream my name during sex.”

Bucky sucks in a sharp breath. He didn’t even realize. His face heats up, and he can’t even hide it, not with Steve still holding his jaw and staring at Bucky with eyes that miss nothing.

“Didn’t mean to,” Bucky mumbles, lowering his eyes. “Slipped out, s’all.”

“Aw,” Steve croons, sweetly mocking. He rubs his face against Bucky’s, making him shiver. “It’s okay, Buck. I’ll let it go this once.”

“Magnanimous of you, _sir_ ,” Bucky gasps, letting his head tip back for Steve’s beard to mark up his throat. Steve bites gently at a straining tendon in answer, laving his tongue over the sting before pulling away.

And then he’s stepping even closer, reaching down between their bodies to press his cock flat against Bucky’s thigh. It’s hard and hot, and when Bucky sneaks a glance down, he finds the end pearled with fluid.

“Oh,” he breathes, mouth watering. “Let – lemme.”

“Mmm, no,” Steve says, chuckling at Bucky’s despairing sound. “Ssh, kid, it’s okay. Just stay there and let me use you up. Yeah?”

“Oh, _god_ , please.”

Steve grinds lazily against him for a few beats, pressing his cock into Bucky’s wet thigh. Then he grabs Bucky’s knee with one hand and forces his leg up, his other hand winding tight around Bucky’s waist to keep him steady. Bucky clings to him gratefully and rests his forehead on Steve’s chest, keeping his eyes wide open because he wants to see, wants to watch.

Steve’s not lazy this time, and he’s not gentle either, rutting viciously against the inside of Bucky’s thigh. Precum smears on his skin, warm and fucking filthy, and there’s nothing Bucky can do to stop the pitiful noises spilling from his mouth or the shudders wracking his body, just like there’s nothing he can do but stand there and let Steve put him to good use.

He clutches harder at Steve, digging flesh and metal fingers into the rippling muscles of his back.

Steve’s cock slides to settle against the crook of Bucky’s thigh. His breath stutters, a groan reverberating through the chest Bucky’s pressed up against. And then Steve’s thrusting his hips into Bucky like he’s fucking him, and it hurts, a little, the merciless pressure against the sensitive skin of his inner thigh. It’s over too soon, Steve pulling back and prying Bucky’s fingers off him, shushing his whine with quick kiss.

He understands why soon enough, when Steve grabs his shoulders and bodily turns him around, arranging Bucky with his hands on the wall, back arched to stick his ass out. Steve shows his appreciation with a gentle slap to his rear, and Bucky laughs, warmth suffusing his veins when Steve laughs with him.

And then he’s pressing close again, spreading Bucky’s ass for Steve’s cock to slide between the cheeks, hot and fucking huge there while Steve plasters his chest to Bucky’s back.

“This good?” he asks, nipping at Bucky’s ear.

Bucky answers by twisting his neck around and catching Steve in a sloppy kiss. Steve growls into it, and the sound goes straight to Bucky’s animal brain. He shudders violently, and it’s like that urges Steve to move. He does, fucking between Bucky’s cheeks in short, jerky motions, and it’s not long before both of them are panting into their kiss. A rough thrust makes Steve’s cockhead press against Bucky’s rim, and he’s helpless not to press back against it, aching to feel it fill him up deep inside.

“Bucky,” Steve groans before kissing him wet and deep, fucking his mouth with his tongue like he knows what Bucky needs. It’s the most natural thing in the world to just melt into it.

He knows when Steve’s close. He’s all teeth, biting hard at Bucky’s mouth and tugging, nipping along his jaw. There’s a frantic edge to his movements, and his hands dig into Bucky’s hips hard enough to bruise deep.

The sudden wet heat between his cheeks still pulls a groan out of him, the sound drowned by Steve’s guttural shout. He sinks his teeth into Bucky’s throat and keeps him there, an animal caught in a predator’s teeth, until Steve’s done riding out the aftershocks.

He doesn’t step away, after, but he does ease his grip on Bucky. He turns him around but holds him close, kissing him a little sweeter.

The clean-up passes in a pleasant haze. The shower comes back on at some point. He gets Steve’s soapy hands all over him. Kisses, stolen and given, laughter passing between mouths.

Steve doesn’t quite carry him to bed, but Bucky doesn’t walk there on his own power either.

They just lie there for a while, under the covers, Bucky all tucked up against Steve. It’s a comfortable bed and big enough to fit them both, even without Bucky more or less using Steve as his mattress.

Reality isn’t held off forever, but for a little while, it’s nice and perfect.

“When do I leave?” Bucky asks eventually, half-hiding in Steve’s armpit.

The fingers sifting through his hair still for a second before continuing their work.

“Whenever you want. We’ll debrief in a couple of hours. If you can, stay for that.”

“It’s not like I have any pressing engagements,” Bucky grumbles. He wriggles closer to Steve – well, he tries, but any closer and he’ll be sinking into Steve’s skin, and hey, there’s an idea. He could just go inside Steve, stay small and safe in his rib cage, pressed close to his strong, beating heart.

“Stay then,” Steve says like it that’s easy.

Bucky says nothing and silence descends on them.

It’s Steve who breaks it a few minutes later.

“So, Natasha, huh?”

“What?” Bucky asks, confused, and then he gets it. “Oh. She said I could call her that.”

“I assumed as much. It’s good. Means she likes you.”

“Half the time, she looks at me like she’s envisioning my guts on the wrong side of my stomach.”

“She does that to all the newcomers. It’ll taper off.”

Bucky huffs a laugh, amused in spite of everything. Guilt pulses in time with it.

“You and your band of weirdos.”

Steve moves suddenly, pinning Bucky under him with an arm and half his body. He squirms on instinct, trying in vain to get free, but Steve just rubs his face against Bucky’s hair and holds him tight like he’s a fucking plushie.

Bucky likes it way too much.

“Steeeeeve,” he whines, nipping at the closest patch of skin. It turns into a kiss before he can help it. Steve eases up, moving so he’s still draped over Bucky without suffocating him.

“You’d fit right in then,” he says, looking right at Bucky.

Bucky looks away. The knot in his chest winds tighter.

There are a few moments where he debates furiously with himself, mind going a mile a minute, but later, when he revisits those minutes, he’ll know that there was only ever one decision he was going to make.

“I’m sorry,” Bucky says. And then, “You should stop taking me on missions. Tell Fury to fuck off.”

Steve doesn’t react visibly. His breathing remains calm, his muscles relaxed, his hands gentle on Bucky.

“Oh? Why is that?”

“You know why.”

He has to. It’s like Bucky told Fury, back when this harebrained mission started. It’s too obvious. Steve won’t fall for it. A toddler wouldn’t.

“Maybe I do,” Steve says levelly. “Maybe I don’t. Tell me, Buck.”

And Bucky, as always, is helpless to deny him anything.

“Fury only accepted your offer so he could spy on you. I don’t really know what he wants to do with the information. Nothing too bad, probably. Blackmail? Maybe. S.H.I.E.L.D really wants to know the identities of your people. Anyway. That’s why I’m here. And it’s been fine so far because it was just you, Clint, and Natasha, and S.H.I.E.L.D already knows about you three, and you haven’t taken me to protected locations or let anything important slip. But now, you’re letting me work with others in your team, and I’m here, Natasha called it Base 3, and I don’t – Steve, you can’t trust me.”

Steve, who’s been listening to Bucky’s rambling talk with a scarily impassive expression, cracks a smile at that.

“To the contrary, I think you’ve just proven that I can.”

Bucky sighs explosively, exasperation mingled with a terrible fondness.

“I am literally telling you I am a spy.”

“Which is a thing spies do all the time, to people they’re spying on.”

Bucky opens his mouth and shuts it with a click.

“This is why I prefer wetwork,” is all he says when he finds his voice again. Steve snorts and, perversely, that drains Bucky of his humor. “Steve, you gotta – this isn’t a laughing matter. I don’t know why you let me work with you in the first place. You must have known Fury would pull this kinda thing. But you have to stop. Tell him you changed your mind, tell him I’m incompetent, it doesn’t matter. Just. Stop.”

Steve cups his face, and Bucky leans into the touch, realizing that he’s shaking a little.

“Do you want to stop?” Steve asks.

“No,” Bucky murmurs, utterly honest. “You’re the best CO I’ve had. And this is a really good team. Working with you is so _easy_. But that’s not important. Keeping you guys safe is. You said it yourself. They’re your family. And I ain’t no good for them, Steve.”

“You are. Your masters aren’t.”

“Yeah, well, kind of a package deal.”

“It doesn’t have to be.”

Bucky freezes. Steve said it so mildly, like he can’t see Bucky drowning in the weight of its implications.

“What do you mean?”

“Tell me something, Buck. Why you think I suggested this, having you on my team, when I’ve been avoiding S.H.I.E.L.D like the plague since the 80s?”

“I – um,” Bucky flounders. He knows the answer, the obvious one, but the way Steve’s looking at him, it feels wrong and stupid. He voices it anyway. “Because you wanted to get Fury off your back and this was the easiest way?”

Steve gives him a put-upon look. Bucky shrinks in on himself a little, and Steve softens almost immediately, petting along Bucky’s cheeks and throat, sliding fingers into his hair and massaging gently.

“Ain’t ever been one for the easy path, Buck. And I’ve held Fury off this long. I can do it for the rest of his reign as Director and afterwards too.”

“Oh. Then. Why?”

“You know the answer, Bucky.”

“I really don’t,” Bucky says. He doesn’t meet Steve’s eyes. He doesn’t let himself think about the right answer because–

He can’t be–

“You. You were the reason.”

Bucky draws into himself, tension tight in his muscles. Steve creeps closer, tentative like he’ll give Bucky space the second he shows he wants it. It occurs him that this really isn’t a conversation they should have in bed, but damn if he’s got the will to get up and get away and talk this out like a proper, functioning adult. Instead, he leans into Steve, lets him wrap Bucky up in his arms.

“I don’t think I’m worth all this, Steve,” he says, half a secret, murmured into the hollow of Steve’s throat.

“I do. Clint does. Nat too. I didn’t make this decision without consulting my team, Bucky.”

Bucky takes a moment to digest that. It sits, instead, like a half-eaten lump in his chest.

“But _why_?” he blurts out, tearing away from Steve’s comforting hold to look him in the eye. “Steve, I’m just an agent. I’m good, I know that, but I’m still just one agent.”

Steve sits up all of a sudden, and Bucky’s given all of a second to mourn the comforting closeness of his body before he’s also being yanked upright. Steve barely lets him find his balance before leaning forward, not to kiss him like Bucky expects for a moment but to hold his face between those huge, warm hands that block out the world and reduce his focus to the surging blue of Steve’s eyes.

“You’re a good man, Bucky Barnes. And a damn capable agent. I asked Fury for you because I wanted you. Not in my bed.” He pauses and amends, “Well, not just in my bed. I wanted you on my team. And more than that, I wanted to treat you better than S.H.I.E.L.D does.”

“S.H.I.E.L.D treats me just fine,” Bucky protests automatically, grimacing when Steve’s expression darkens.

“They lied to you and sent you to interfere with my missions. Before I offered the compromise, Fury was willing to let me keep you prisoner for far longer because he didn’t want to cave first. And maybe he knew I had lines I wouldn’t cross, but that’s not a risk he should have taken, not when he could have gotten you out. And your arm – Bucky, you were damn near delirious from pain when I reconnected, and you told me it’s usually worse, that they don’t sedate you when they work on it. That’s not treating you well.”

Bucky swallows convulsively, not knowing how to even begin responding to that. It’s not that any of what Steve said is untrue, but that’s just how things are in their world. Well, in S.H.I.E.L.D’s world. It’s obvious the Avengers operate on a whole other frequency.

“That’s just the way S.H.I.E.L.D works,” he says in the end. “I knew it when I joined up. And I knew it when I signed up for the Winter Soldier program.”

“Did you?” Steve asks, and his voice is still calm, but the question sends a shiver through Bucky anyway.

“I knew enough,” he snaps, defensive. “I don’t need saving, Steve.”

“Maybe not. But I want you. With me and on my team. Would that be so bad?”

Bucky tries to be angry or at least irritated, but it’s hard to muster that in the face of Steve’s good intentions. And it wouldn’t be so bad.

It wouldn’t be bad at all.

“Poaching is bad etiquette,” Bucky grumbles, turning his head to bite at Steve’s fingers. Steve doesn’t take his hand away in time, and Bucky ends up with Steve’s thumb clamped between his teeth like a feral dog on the way to being tamed.

The way Steve’s looking at him, he sure as hell feels like a puppy.

“I’m a bad, bad man,” Steve says with such faux-seriousness that Bucky starts laughing, the noise muffled by Steve’s thumb in his mouth.

Bucky sobers up too quickly and releases Steve from his teeth but leans into him until he’s half in his lap again.

“Hey, Steve. Thank you.”

“Bucky, you don’t have to–”

“Sweetheart, shut up.” Miraculously, Steve does. “Thank you. It’s – it’s a hell of a thing, what you’ve tried to do for me.”

“It wasn’t selfless,” Steve tells him. The look on his face is soft enough to make Bucky ache. “And that’s not an answer.”

“It’s not. Can I – can I have some time to think about it?”

Steve kisses him, chaste and sweet.

“You can take all the time you need.”


	3. angel or demon (i gave up my soul)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “He really got to you, didn’t he?” Fury murmurs, more to himself than Bucky. “I don’t want to do this, Barnes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter also has some **non-linear storytelling** , and hey, it’s not sex this time. Variety!
> 
> You can find my [tumblr here](https://voxofthevoid.tumblr.com/), and the update schedule for the month [is here](https://voxofthevoid.tumblr.com/post/187351086866/posting-schedule-september).

Sharon Carter is appointed Captain America on July 4th, 2021. It’s a nice, chilly Sunday, the sun nowhere to be seen, the cloud cover comforting instead of ominous. The weather really doesn’t matter for the indoor ceremony, but Bucky appreciates the glimpse he catches in between the rush of it all.

Appointing a new Captain is a Big Deal – the kind that comes with capital letters and the President of the United States – and it’s an even bigger deal this time because Sharon’s the first female bearer of the title. That also means the amount of death threats are double the usual, everyone from hardcore MRAs to your run-of-the-mill misogynist chipping in to add a casual ‘die lol’ and worse. Bucky’s part of her security detail and between the rest of his team and the Secret Service, the whole ceremony is a fucking nightmare.

To him, at least. The general public is ecstatic. Bucky really wishes S.H.I.E.L.D would do this in a drab room somewhere like they do the rest of their business. He knows it’s not possible, Captain America is too big for one organization and even one country these days, but it’s sure nice to imagine.

The ceremony goes off without a hitch.

Afterwards, once things have calmed down somewhat, Bucky manages to give Sharon a hug and a whispered congratulations. She grins back, radiant and genuinely happy, looking completely at home in her new red-white-blue suit. He’s happy for her despite his loathing for the pomp and parade, and in the end, he’s glad to end the day on a high note.

The next morning, he goes to S.H.I.E.L.D and announces his resignation to Fury’s face.

-

Well, he tries.

-

“Is this because we chose Carter over you?”

There’s a long, tense moment in which Bucky just stands there gaping, stunned speechless.

“Are you kidding me?” he manages to choke out. Fury stares impassively at him. Behind him, Hill is similarly stone-faced. They are decidedly not kidding. He doesn’t know how this, of all things, can surprise him so much, but it really, really does. “For fuck’s sake, come on. You asked me whether I wanted the title. I said no. Remember that? I said ‘hell no, you couldn’t pay me to prance around in the goddamn American flag.’ That ring a bell?”

“You have to admit the timing points to it,” Hill says, voice as neutral as her face. She could be planning his murder as she speaks, and he wouldn’t know.

“The timing points to me wanting to see my friend decorated in a way _she deserves_ before I blow this joint and fuck off with my boyfriend.”

Fury’s face does something complicated and painful. Hill suddenly looks like she wants a drink or ten.

“Your boyfriend,” Fury repeats, disdain dripping.

“Well, he’s far from a boy, I admit,” Bucky says, grinning toothily. He keeps something vicious tucked behind his teeth like a secret. “But partner sounds just wrong in this line of work, I’ve never really liked saying significant other, and you really don’t want to hear what I call him in my head or out loud. So boyfriend it is.”

If looks could kill, Fury would have him reduced to a smear on the floor by now.

“Barnes,” Hill sighs, shooting him a look that’s more exasperated than anything else. Bucky shrugs. Maybe he’d act like less of an ass if their response to his announcement wasn’t to ask if he was jealous of his coworker.

“I knew letting you run with Rogers was a bad idea.”

“Well, Director, you’re the reason we ever met in the first place.”

He can see it, Fury’s temper flaring and then calming down, just like that, because yes, the man is intimidating and prone to yelling, but he’s no hothead, and he didn’t get this far by running on emotions.

“Agent Barnes, there’s a certain protocol to be followed in resigning from S.H.I.E.L.D.” Bucky can almost see the air-quotes around _resigning_ , and he thinks with no real humor that most agents either die in the field or become too injured for it, at which point they become admin drones, again until they die or are too old and ‘mentally unfit’ to continue the work. Fury frowns like he can read the uncharitable direction of Bucky’s thoughts. “Protocol that you haven’t followed.”

“Yes, I have,” Bucky says mildly. “Three-month notice, during which S.H.I.E.L.D is free to review my case and decide if there are…complications that need to be addressed. I did submit my notice three months ago. And HR didn’t contact me, so I assumed there was nothing to discuss. As protocol dictates, my contract is over, and you’re legally obliged to let me go.”

By the time he finishes, Fury’s frown has escalated into an impressive scowl and even Hill looks nonplussed.

“No such notice was submitted,” she says.

Bucky shrugs nonchalantly and keeps his expression blank.

“Hey, I did my part. You can check your systems.”

Fury does. His fingers fly over his desk and a holographic screen blinks to life. Bucky watches his face, nerves thrumming with caution and excitement as Fury’s expression darkens with each progressive minute.

He wasn’t all that sure, agreeing to this particular idea, but he knew even then that following the rules wasn’t an option, not in this. Because in the end, S.H.I.E.L.D only followed its own rules when it wanted to, and in Bucky’s case, it’s guaranteed that it wouldn’t want to.

Sure enough, Fury dismisses the documents with a hard tap of his finger and turns his one-eyed glare on Bucky.

“Barnes,” he growls. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Leaving,” Bucky says softly, and then, louder, “I made a choice. That’s all.”

“It’s the wrong one.”

“You’re entitled your opinion. Even when it’s wrong.”

“You’ve known Rogers barely a year. His dick’s not worth leaving behind everything you’ve built here.”

“Director, all I’ve ‘built’ here–” Bucky is blatant in his air-quotes, making them in between the two of them without a care for the way it makes Fury’s eyebrow twitch. “–is a kill count in the hundreds and half a dozen semi-legal bank accounts. There’s more to life than that. There’s more to me than that.”

He can almost hear Steve echo those words, his voice proud and pleased, his eyes infinitely kind.

For a moment, Fury says nothing. Then he slumps in his chair, still looking intently at Bucky.

“He really got to you, didn’t he?” Fury murmurs, more to himself than Bucky. “I don’t want to do this, Barnes.”

Bucky’s not so great a fool that he thinks Fury is talking about letting Bucky resign. He braces himself and draws his gun, but it falls from metal fingers that suddenly turn stiff and unresponsive. There is a moment of blissful numbness before the pain whites out his mind.

-

“You’re a fucking idiot, Barnes,” Bucky tells himself the moment he gathers his bearings. “A fucking _idiot_ _sandwich_.”

“You can say that again,” Sharon says from the other side of the glass.

The right side. Because Bucky’s in a S.H.I.E.L.D containment slash observation cell. Because he got himself there. They’ve given him the standard cot without pillows, starchy white sheets, and metal toilet affixed to one wall.

He is a fucking idiot.

“Bucky,” Sharon sighs. “What the hell is this?”

It so closely echoes what Fury said earlier that Bucky almost loses his shit from apoplectic rage right there. But he calms down, mostly because his instinctive left-armed punch only serves to remind him that his left arm is dead metal and he’s a fucking sitting duck here. Alright, it doesn’t take his anger away, but it does make him calm down in spite of it, training and a lifetime of experience kicking in.

“What are you doing here, Sharon?”

“Fury sent me,” she says because of course he did. Bucky’s a solo operative most of the time, but Sharon’s the agent he’s worked with the most, the closest he has to a partner. Damn right Fury sent her. “He said to, uh, talk some sense into you.”

“Yeah? He also tell you I’m throwing a tantrum over not getting the Cap title?”

He’s pleased and surprised to see her looking sincerely taken aback.

“What? Fuck no. Bucky, you hated being even considered for the title. You weren’t really subtle about it.”

“Should have been even less subtle apparently.”

Sharon exhales sharply.

“Listen, I don’t know what the fuck that’s got to do with this. Fury said you were trying to resign and to talk some sense into you. And here I fucking am because what the fuck, Bucky? That’s not – S.H.I.E.L.D is your life.”

“That’s the fucking problem,” he snaps. “I want more out of life, and I know how to get it. Does Fury have an actual reason to hold me here, other than his hissy fit?”

Sharon shoots a significant look at the ceiling that he pointedly ignores. Of course they’re watching and listening. Fucking let them.

“I’m not sure,” she says after a pause. “Probably. He can’t just keep you here otherwise.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow. Sharon grimaces.

“Not indefinitely,” she amends.

Bucky’s got his doubts about that too, but he’s more concerned by what she – very deliberately – let slip. They really are planning to hold him here until he sees the error of his ways. And he doesn’t think they’re going to let the grey walls and lack of hair products do the convincing.

Bucky’s not imagining torture or anything truly terrible. Fury’s not evil. Harsh, ruthless, manipulative; but nowhere close to evil or even truly cruel.

It still won’t be a pleasant stay for Bucky.

He wonders how long he’s had that failsafe in his arm; whether it’s been there from the beginning or if they added it after he returned from the mission that put him in Steve’s path. He did need maintenance, then, to make sure the cuff Steve used to deactivate his arm didn’t have any lasting effects. Bucky knew some details about the work done on his arm but not all of it. And he was always dizzy and half-gone from the pain after it reconnected. It would have been the easiest thing for the S.H.I.E.L.D technicians to build in a kill switch.

All of a sudden, he’s tired of this shit.

He should have listened to Clint and Natasha.

“Sharon, I’m not changing my mind. Nothing’s gonna make me. You might as well leave.”

He doesn’t wait for her response before lying back down, turning towards the wall and curling up. It’s uncomfortable, lying on his left side. The arm works as seamlessly as any organic part of him when it’s functional, but like this, everything about it is alien. He hates it. But he doesn’t turn over.

It's a long time before footsteps let him know she has left.

-

“That was a hell of a risk, what you did,” Bucky tells Steve point-blank the next time they meet.

It’s not a mission. There’s a black, compact cellphone burning in Bucky’s front pocket with only Steve’s number programmed in. Steve promised him no one will be able to trace it, and Bucky believes him, but this still feels so illicit, even though all he’s doing is having a nice dinner with the guy he’s been fucking on the regular for half a year.

No sooner than that thought passes through Bucky’s head, he’s blurting, “Wait, is this a date?”

Opposite him, Steve blinks.

“Sometimes,” he says at length, “I want to peel open your skull and take a peek just to see what’s going on in there. Your head’s an interesting place, Buck.”

“Thank you, I needed that image to go with my pasta.”

Steve shrugs, and his face is impassive, but Bucky’s not fooled. He knows that glint in his eyes.

“Asshole.”

“It is a date,” Steve says, all casual-like. “We can’t go out in public unless you’re willing to let me whisk you away to some island tucked away out of S.H.I.E.L.D’s eyes. But I pulled some strings, now this apartment’s mine for the weekend. A dine-in date.”

Bucky, inexplicably, blushes.

Well, he pretends it’s inexplicable but honestly, Steve’s been pulling that reaction out of him in spades. It’s terrible. It makes Bucky’s guts squirm like they want to wriggle out through his asshole and wrap Steve in a hug.

“You don’t want to?”

Steve’s voice is softer now, with uncertainty threaded in. It’s a humanizing effect on a man that’s made a career out of being inscrutable and controlled, and Bucky gets the feeling that Steve’s making a conscious choice to let Bucky see his feelings. And that means a lot, almost more than knowing Steve is uncertain and hasn’t just assumed that Bucky will fall all over himself to take what he can get, all he can get, when it comes to this man.

It feels ridiculous too, at the same time, that he hasn’t assumed. Bucky’s not subtle, not with this. Never was.

“I want to,” Bucky says, smiling. He feels almost shy when he meets Steve’s eyes. “Didn’t know you were a romantic at heart, Steve.”

Steve shrugs, but he’s smiling too, the expression as soft as the way his eyes are trailing all over Bucky.

“Haven’t had much of a reason to be, recently. Until you.”

This time, Bucky flushes all the way down his neck.

They eat in silence for a while, the air between them weighted by the words exchanged. It’s hardly a confession of undying love, but it’s certainly not nothing. And if Steve were a meaningless fuck, Bucky would be unsubtly edging out the door right now, but he’s not and never was, and if anything, Bucky’s relieved and delighted that he’s not the only one whose emotions got involved alongside his dick.

“What did you mean by risk?” Steve asks eventually, and it takes Bucky a moment to even remember what he’s talking about.

When he does, Bucky straightens up, the weightless feeling he’s been nursing for the last few minutes vanishing just like that.

“Me. This thing you’re doing, seducing me over to the dark side.” He shakes his head when Steve opens his mouth, predicting the protest. “I’m kidding, mostly. You’re not on the dark side anyway. It’s not the sex though. Or, um, this. Not _us_. But the Avengers and me. You couldn’t have known I’d be…conflicted about my mission.”

“I couldn’t,” Steve agrees placidly, and that’s how Bucky knows that whatever he argues with, Steve’s already picked his hill to die on. “But I had a good feeling about you. And you didn’t do anything to change my mind during our missions or outside of them.”

“I did give S.H.I.E.L.D information,” Bucky points out, feeling his stomach swoop as he does. “I had to. Mission reports.”

“You told them about Nat’s changing hairdos and Clint’s low-priority safe house. Truly sensitive information, that.”

Steve’s tone is a blend of amused and fond. Bucky quietly meeps and shovels pasta into his mouth. Steve watches him stuff his face and hide behind a fork like it’s the best sight he’s ever seen, and fuck, Bucky wants to keep this man.

“Natasha would have killed me if I told them her actual hair color, let’s be real.” And then it occurs to him– “Wait, how the fuck do you know what I told S.H.I.E.L.D?”

Steve leans back in his chair, grinning wide enough to make his eyes crinkle. He’s never up for good when he smiles like that, but Bucky’s heart gives a traitorous flip anyway.

“I can’t believe – you know, I’m dutybound or whatever to tell S.H.I.E.L.D you’ve got spies there.”

“I never said I had spies there. And you won’t.”

“I won’t,” Bucky snaps, scowling. “But you can’t just assume that! Don’t just – just–”

“Trust you?” Steve asks quietly.

Bucky has swallow before speaking.

“Yeah.”

“I do, Buck.”

“You shouldn’t. Listen, I haven’t even agreed to join you guys yet. I’ve been with S.H.I.E.L.D for a decade, Steve. It’s been the most formative part of my life. I can’t just leave that.”

“You don’t have to,” Steve says, so patient that he pisses Bucky off a little. “But you haven’t said you won’t, either.”

Bucky knows exactly why it rankles so much, the faith Steve has in him.

“It’s still a risk, Steve. I’m a risk.”

“So I took a leap of faith.” Steve smiles, the small, sweet one that makes Bucky’s chest feel ten sizes too small. “I don’t and won’t regret it, Bucky. Whatever you choose.”

“And your team?” Bucky challenges, defiant despite the part of him that wants to vault over the table and kiss Steve until neither of them can breathe. “You said you’d do anything to keep them safe, but this is dangerous to them too.”

At that, Steve sharpens, sitting up straight. Bucky doesn’t even realize he was slouching until the sudden change in posture goes right to his dick.

“They were never in danger. Bucky, I took a chance on you. And during the missions with Nat and Clint, you only vindicated my decision. But if you hadn’t come clean after meeting Ant-man and Wasp, at least before our next job, I would have had to let you go.” Steve pauses, letting out a huffing breath that’s half laughter. “Mission failure, I suppose.”

Bucky tries to envision that, these little adventures stopping. No more of Steve whisking him away at the most random times. No more of Clint’s lame jokes and Natasha’s scathing quips. No more missions that were fun and bloody instead of boring, unpleasant, and bloody.

His mind rebels viciously at the thought. He’s so fucked, and it’s nothing he didn’t already know, but it manages to have the weight and gravity of an epiphany each time.

He doesn’t look at Steve when he asks, “If the Avengers were never in danger, what was your leap of faith about?”

There’s no answer for a while. Bucky looks up, eventually, because he thinks that’s what Steve’s waiting for. But Steve’s looking down at his plate and not seeing anything on it.

“Steve?” Bucky prompts tentatively, and Steve raises his head, bright blue eyes catching on Bucky’s.

“Me,” he says, so softly that Bucky has to strain to catch it. “That was for me, Buck. I liked you a little too much, from the beginning. I told you, didn’t I? It wasn’t selfless.”

Bucky takes a minute to digest the implications of that. When he does, his heart starts pounding fiercely, threatening to jump out of his ribs and into Steve’s arms.

“I – Steve.”

He swallows, words crowding up his throat.

“Buck, you don’t have to–”

“I liked you too much too. From the start. I still do. A lot.”

It’s a graceless confession, but the way Steve’s expression breaks into something startled and soft makes Bucky feel like he’s ten feet tall.

-

By Bucky’s internal clock, it’s after a little less than twenty hours since he woke that he gets his second visitor. He has slept in that time, not for long, but in two-hour catnaps. He’s gone longer on less, but that kind of thing takes its toll eventually, and Bucky wants to be in possession of all his mental faculties for what’s coming.

He’s facing the glass when he hears the sound of footsteps. He does seriously consider turning away and pretending to sleep but curiosity gets the best of him, and anyway, if his visitor irritates him, he can always give them the cold shoulder – literally, now – later.

But he’s not prepared to see Sam Wilson.

“The fuck are you doing here?” he says harshly before Sam can so much as open his mouth. But Sam takes it in stride in that way he has, levelling Bucky with a no-nonsense stare that easily rivals what Bucky remembers of his mom.

“You tell me, Barnes.”

“I’m – man, how are you even here? You don’t work for S.H.I.E.L.D anymore.”

“Technically, Samuel Wilson never worked for S.H.I.E.L.D. Captain America did.” The way says it, with an unsubtle glance upwards, tells Bucky that those words aren’t meant for him at all. “And I’m here because a little birdie told me your fool ass got yourself thrown in a cell, and as much as I wanted to stay in bed and pretend I didn’t hear that, all that superheroing’s left some permanent side-effects.”

For the first time since he woke up here, Bucky leaves the bed for something that’s not pissing. He finds himself grinning too because of course Sam can pull a smile out of him even in the worst situations.

“Nah, that’s one-hundred percent certified Sam Wilson bullshit. Captain America ain’t got shit to do with your moral fiber.”

Sam manages to look both pissed and pleased at the same time.

He taps at the keypad near the door, and for a moment, Bucky’s heart stops, but the door doesn’t open and he doesn’t get to walk out. He wondered, in that split-second, whether Sam managed to talk some sense into Fury but apparently not. Instead, the little chute meant for feeding him opens up. Sam sets a neatly wrapped, delicious-smelling package on the tray.

Bucky doesn’t take it, keeping his eye on Sam.

“C’mon, man, I wouldn’t poison you.”

“Yeah, no shit.” Bucky rolls his eyes. “I trust you, but not the assholes who put me in here.”

Sam keeps smiling but his eyes tighten at the corner, a sure sign of anger. Sam’s not prone to losing his temper, but Bucky is his friend and well, he wasn’t kidding about that moral fiber.

“They didn’t touch it,” Sam promises. “It’s a fucking burger. Not much I can do with it.”

“I dunno, I was hoping you’d snuck in an EMP.”

But he takes the burger and all but inhales it, all the while Sam watches with a half-concerned, half-disgusted expression on his face. His voice is grave when he asks, “They didn’t feed you?”

“They tried. Some formless nutrient goop. I didn’t touch it.”

“Don’t blame you,” Sam mutters. He nods at Bucky’s arm. “Is that…?”

“Yep.” Bucky smiles, grim and humorless. “I’m getting the VIP treatment. Surprised they let you in, really.”

“They weren’t happy about it. What the hell though. This is fucked up.”

“Tell me about it. So why are you here? They sent Sharon in, told her to talk sense into me.”

He’s pretty sure she’s the one who told Sam too. They’re closer to each other than to Bucky, and damn if S.H.I.E.L.D’s confidentiality policy would stop either of them from gossiping like teenagers.

“That’s an exercise in futility if there ever was one. Nah. I just wanted to see you were okay.”

“I am. Well, I’m not hurt. And I doubt they’ll try to change that. I’m not happy, but,” Bucky shrugs, “it’s my fault, really. Should have called in my resignation from another continent.”

That’s what Sam did, more or less. Announced, to cameras shoved in his face after a very public mess in Poland, that he was giving up the title. Not much S.H.I.E.L.D or anyone else could do after that. Sam’s contract was up anyway. All he had to do was not renew it.

The reference pulls a smirk out of Sam which gentles into a smile. Bucky smiles back, realizing how much better he’s feeling with Sam here. He’d like him to stay, he really would, but–

“They can’t just keep you here,” Sam says before Bucky can speak. “You haven’t done anything wrong.”

Well, he has. That leave of absence sure as fuck didn’t get into S.H.I.E.L.D’s systems legitimately. But Bucky being in this cell is proof enough that trying the legitimate route wouldn’t have worked out either. Maybe if he were, as Steve once put it, not one of S.H.I.E.L.D’s most valuable assets, and if Fury didn’t take Steve’s continued defiance of him personally, he’d be able to just leave.

As it is, well, desperate times and all that.

“You’re right, Sam. They can’t. But you can’t fight them on this, and you shouldn’t try. I’m glad you visited, I really am, but you should go home.” Sam narrows his eyes, gearing up to protest, and Bucky hurries to speak over him. “Not that I mind your company, but being in a cell doesn’t make me very chatty.”

Sam keeps frowning at him, eyes intent like he’s trying to figure Bucky out. Bucky tries to pull an innocent face and grimaces when that just makes Sam more suspicious.

He hates lying to his friends.

“Sam,” Bucky hisses, a little desperate. “Just leave, man.”

Too late.

The lights start flashing red and the sirens wail, those only last for two seconds before everything goes dark and quiet.

-

“Tony Stark?”

Bucky doesn’t intend it as a question; well, he does, but it’s not the man’s identity he’s questioning, it’s the situation that has placed the two of them in this room. Because Tony Stark, what the fuck?

The man in question blinks at Bucky with eyes that are bloodshot and slightly manic.

“Yes? Were you calling me or just whispering my name in helpless adulation?”

Bucky walks backwards until he hits a brick wall that promptly slides its arms around him.

“Steve?” he says without taking his eyes off Stark. “Why is Tony Stark in this room?”

Stark perks up at that, eyeing Bucky with an expression he’s not strictly comfortable with, especially when it lingers for a generous amount of time on his metal arm. The plates recalibrate threateningly, but that only intensifies Stark’s stare.

“We’ll explain that in a bit,” Steve says, but Stark’s speaking almost before he’s done.

“I am Iron Man.”

It’s a very simple statement. The drama is in how undramatic it is.

Bucky grinds the heel of his right arm against his forehead as if that will stave off the impending metaphorical headache.

“Right. Of course you are. Steve fucking Rogers is alive and also the world’s most effective vigilante. Tony fucking Stark is Iron Man. I want to say nothing will surprise me anymore, but that’s just begging for trouble I cannot fucking handle.”

“I’m sure you can handle it, Buck,” Steve says, the bastard not even hiding his amusement as he herds Bucky towards a chair. “And mind your language.”

“Steve, seriously.”

Bucky notices then that the table at the center of the room is literally round. He’d make some quip about that, but honestly, he’s still processing Tony Stark being Iron Man. Sure, the guy more or less vanished from the social pages – and trashy gossip rags – a decade ago when he handed the company over to Pepper Potts and announced he was going into rehab. But he’s still Tony Stark. Half his company’s new projects are credited to him.

“Now, as for why I’m in the room,” Stark begins, but Steve cuts him off with, “Tony’s our tech guy.”

“I thought Friday was your tech guy. Girl. Person.”

Bucky has just enough time to notice the comically offended look on Stark’s face before someone says, “Not quite, Agent Barnes.”

There’s nothing special about the voice itself. It’s pleasant and markedly Irish. Would be perfectly normal too if it originated from a person instead of from seemingly everywhere in the room.

“Uh.”

“Friday – think of that name in, like, all caps if it helps. She’s my AI. Well, one of them. Her big bro’s busy with other duties so she wrangles the Avengers.”

“Her big bro – you?”

Stark blanches. It’s Friday – FRIDAY? – who replies.

“Certainly not.”

“No, no that’s – I’m more her father than–”

“No,” says the AI.

Stark looks offended again and kinda pitiful, like a kicked puppy.

Steve clears his throat.

“Tony, focus.”

Stark mutters something Bucky can’t make out, but then he straightens in his chair and leans forward, returning to his too-intent examination of Bucky.

“So you’re the guy who lit a fire under dear Cap’s ass.”

“Steve’s not Captain America.”

“He is when you grew up hearing your dad rhapsodize about Cap this, Steve that. Gotta get my little pleasures when I can.”

Bucky sneaks a glance at Steve but finds him staring at Stark with fond exasperation. As if sensing Bucky watching, he turns to him, catches his eye, and winks.

“Ew, no, put that face away, Steve, it’s disgusting.” Tony doesn’t look disgusted, just vaguely thoughtful as he turns to Bucky. He gives him a very obvious once-over. “Not my type but then, finely aged patriotism isn’t my type either. You do you. Don’t make me hear a thing though. That’s worse than finding your parents are fucking.”

There’s just so much to unpack in that one rant that Bucky’s struck speechless. Steve, clearly used to Stark, is quicker to react.

“Tony has known me since he was a kid,” he tells Bucky.

“And he’s directly responsible for half my daddy issues,” Stark quips helpfully.

Bucky abruptly feels like he’s stumbled into a soap opera and has a moment of fear for this future life with the Avengers.

“This is fascinating,” Bucky says before the retort he can see building on Steve’s tongue has a chance to be said. “And I’d love to hear all about it later when I’m not planning to somewhat illegally quit my job to join your merry band of vigilantes.”

That does bring them back on track. Steve even gives him an apologetic look that just makes Bucky grin.

“Speaking of that,” Stark, for maybe the first time, sounds absolutely serious, “why do you want to join the Avengers?”

And this, at least, is easy.

“Steve asked.”

Steve, seated halfway between Bucky and Stark, probably so he can keep an eye on them both easily like the control freak Bucky has discovered he is, shoots Bucky a look that can’t decide whether it’s smitten or disapproving.

The thing is that they’ve had this conversation a hundred times already, and while the end goal is what they both want, they can’t seem to see eye-to-eye on the reasoning. It’s not that Bucky agreed because he’s fucking – _dating_ and god, he’s gotta get used to that – Steve. But he is doing this because of Steve; because Steve read Bucky’s S.H.I.E.L.D file with its long list of the dead and the damned, saw his sins lit up in holographic green, and decided he could help save the world.

That’s a hell of a thing to tell an assassin.

Bucky’s not tortured by his job. He doesn’t think he’s evil. But he is a realist, and he knows he’s no hero. The Avengers are imperfect too, but they’re the closest to heroes that this world has.

Sometimes, Bucky doesn’t know why he ever imagined he’d say no.

Sometimes, he thinks he’s a fucking idiot for saying yes.

But he’s not changing his mind.

He can’t tell any of this to Stark, couldn’t find the words even if he wanted to, but the essence of it, he can share. Bucky’s here because Steve asked. And he’ll stay for as long as he wants him.

Somehow, he’s not surprised when Stark nods easily and accepts the answer.

Bucky grins triumphantly at Steve, who shakes his head but doesn’t bother hiding the quirk of his lips. Bucky’s seized by the overpowering urge to go to him and cover that big, furry face in kisses. He resists because he’s a goddamn professional.

Stark, who’s been ignoring the byplay in favor of doing something on his holopad, absently asks, “So, what does the Terrible Two think of this plan?”

“The terrible – you mean Clint and Natasha?”

“Bingo,” Stark says without sparing Bucky a glance. He almost asks but then decides against it, and a quick look at Steve earns him a shrug and a gesture to go ahead.

“They think it’s a stupid idea and, to quote Clint, ‘you should ghost them the way I did,’ which, okay, I see the appeal. But no. S.H.I.E.L.D, whatever its faults, gave me purpose when the army chewed me up and spat me out. Fury can be a right ass, but he means well. Least I can do is tell him what I’m doing to his face.”

Stark looks up suddenly, eyes sharp despite the bags of exhaustion under them.

“And if that blows up in _your_ face?”

Bucky shrugs, and his shoulders don’t lose their stiff tension, but he does keep his voice even.

“Then all of you get to tell me I told you so. Except you, Steve.”

“It’s your decision, Buck,” Steve tells him, same as before.

He doesn’t like the plan either, doesn’t like that it puts Bucky at risk. But Bucky can also see that there’s a part of him that admires the sheer gall of it. And he thinks, though he hasn’t yet mustered the nerve to present this particular theory to Steve, that the man who jumped from a plane flown by a civilian engineer into enemy territory for an unsanctioned rescue mission just because it was the right thing to do – he thinks that man is the part of Steve that appreciates why Bucky wants to do this.

Of course, that stunt changed Captain America from a dancing fool and turned him into a weapon of war. Bucky’s action won’t have such dramatic returns. But it’s what he plans to do.

“Of course you’d say that,” Stark mutters. “It’s what your star-spangled ass would do.”

“Language, Tony,” Steve corrects mildly, remaining impassive in the face of the twin judgmental stares that find him. Bucky’s so fond of him, it’s hard to breathe sometimes.

It’s what he plans to do. But he’s not going into it blind and he’s not going to believe in S.H.I.E.L.D’s goodwill to get him out of it alive. That’s why they’re here, and that’s why Tony’s here, and as the three of them settle into planning what is, technically, treachery, Bucky can’t stop probing at himself for guilt or shame or even fear.

But what he finds is hard-edged conviction and the memory of Steve’s smile when Bucky gave him an answer.

-

It’s Bucky’s turn to take a leap of faith.

-

“Man, what the hell?” Sam says into the sudden darkness.

It’s pitch black; emergency lights should have been activated by now, unless something is specifically preventing it. Bucky half-expects guards to rush to his cell, but he knows how S.H.I.E.L.D works. He’s only a prisoner of convenience and low-priority. These cells are designed to hold without power, but they can’t survive a strong and calculated attack from the outside.

“Sam,” Bucky sighs. “I guess it’s too late to tell you to leave. Safer to stay now.”

“It is,” says a voice that doesn’t belong to either of them but makes Bucky’s heart fucking sing. “Nice to meet you, Sam Wilson.”

Sam’s understandably silent and prepared for an attack, if Bucky knows him at all.

“Guys, don’t fight,” Bucky warns, almost flat against the glass now. “Steve, come on.”

“Steve?” Sam asks the same time one of the overhead lights flicker to life.

Bucky saw Steve the night before Sharon’s appointment. They kissed and fucked and spent hours just lying in bed, trading stories in the dark because neither of them could sleep.

It shouldn’t hit him this hard, seeing Steve here, but it does.

And god, what a sight he makes. He’s not wearing his usual suit. This one’s darker, the star at the center a mere impression set into a drab striped pattern. His sleeves end halfway, revealing muscled forearms peppered with fine grey hairs.

Bucky wants to fucking sit on his dick right there.

He says as much.

There’s a brief, stunned silence.

“What the _fuck_ ,” Sam says, softly but with great feeling.

“Buck,” Steve huffs through a laugh. “Don’t have an off-mode, do you, sweetheart?”

He’s doing something to the door, while Sam watches warily but does not interrupt. Bucky doesn’t miss how his eyes are bug-eyed as they rest on the shield – a polished grey that Steve told him is the original color, sans any patriotic paint – strapped to Steve’s back. Even without the iconic red, white, and blue, it’s not hard to put the pieces together, at least for Sam who grew up on Captain America comics and ended up being Captain America in his thirties. Sam’s seen it before, but no one suspected the shield-wielding man in the Avengers to be Steve Rogers himself after all. Well, no one but conspiracy theorists in deep corners of the internet. Sam even had his own star-spangled shield, and now Sharon’s got it, but they’re replicas – effective and lethal, but not made of fucking vibranium and more of a symbol than the Captains’ primary weapon.

“You know I don’t,” Bucky answers absently, eyes on Sam who in turn is peering intently at Steve’s face as if mentally erasing the beard, subtracting a few decades, and adding a little blonde.

“I know,” Steve says fondly and takes a long step back. Sam starts but holds his position.

The door kinda…melts. Bucky steps out delicately, careful not to burn his shoes.

Then he kisses Steve right on the mouth, hard and fierce.

“Sam,” he pants when he pulls back, “this is my boyfriend, Steve. Steve, my friend, Sam.”

Steve nods at him. Sam nods back. It would be very casual and civilized except for aura of danger radiating off Steve and the wide-eyed expression on Sam’s face.

“It’s good to meet you, Sam. I’ve heard good things about you. But Bucky and I gotta leave now. That going to be a problem?”

“Sam, hey,” Bucky hurries to explain. “This was planned. I didn’t intend to stay in a cell till Fury saw sense.”

“I can see that,” Sam says after a beat, and he’s calm now, dark eyes assessing. He gives Bucky a long, hard look before his gaze flits to Steve. “No. No trouble. Would have liked to meet you under better circumstances, but I’m used to this kind of shit. Go, before someone comes.”

“One moment,” Steve says, reaching behind him to pull out, from god knows where, a contraption that Bucky recognizes with a flare of delighted relief. “Buck, can I help?”

“Yes, makes this faster.”

It only takes a few seconds for them to strap Bucky’s metal arm securely to his chest, where it won’t dangle at his side and wreak holy havoc on his back muscles and spine when they run. He kisses Steve again, has to, and isn’t even bothered by Sam’s audibly exasperated cursing in the background.

“Guys, _go_ ,” Sam snaps.

Steve shoots him a sharp salute, and Bucky half-loses it at Sam’s expression.

“Bye, Sam!”

They book it out of there.

Bucky takes the gun Steve offers him gratefully. He doesn’t check whether it’s a tranq; he knows.

They do encounter a few agents along the way, but they’re taken down easily between the two of them. He’s never seen Steve shoot before, never even imagined it because in his head, everything about Steve in action is tied to that shield. But it’s a hell of a sight, and yeah, he really doesn’t have an off-mode, not with Steve.

“What did you guys _do_?” Bucky asks once they make it to the elevator without being swarmed like he half-expected.

“Not a lot,” Steve says, a little too lightly for Bucky to believe him. Steve’s expression, set in a hard grin that’s as arousing as terrifying, doesn’t help. He catches Bucky looking and his expression softens. “Hey, kid. You okay?”

“I’m fine.” Bucky tries to roll his eyes, but he’s too pleased to really pull it off. “I knew you’d come.”

“Of course, Buck. I told you. We take care of our own.”

“No. You told me you take care of what’s _yours_.”

Steve’s eyes darken, and it’s probably one hell of a liability, the way they get to each other, but it’s nothing Bucky’s ever felt before and he’s hungry for it, hoarding each intense flash of feeling and its mirror in Steve’s eyes.

“I do,” Steve growls, and if they were alone, they’d be on each other, but they’re breaking out of fucking S.H.I.E.L.D so they gotta keep it in their pants.

The elevator opens to a floor that’s just a little on fire.

“Uh, Steve?”

“It’s fine, come on.”

His heart pounding in his ears isn’t enough to block out the sound of something that’s suspiciously similar to repulsor blasts.

“Is S – Iron Man here?”

“He insisted,” Steve says, not even out of breath as they sprint full-speed down an empty corridor. “He won’t do harm. Just cause some mayhem.”

“I’d normally frown upon that kinda thing at my workplace, but y’know, being locked up like that has done wonders for my perspective. S.H.I.E.L.D can suck my dick.”

“I’ll suck your dick,” Steve says happily, coming to an abrupt halt. Bucky follows suit less gracefully. “And this isn’t your workplace anymore. You ready to jump out a window with me, kid?”

“Guess that’s one way to drive home my resignation. Sure, why not?”

Steve doesn’t look at him, canvassing the area for hostiles. But he does clamp one tree trunk of an arm on Bucky’s shoulder.

“Trust me, Bucky.”

“You know I do.”

“Then come.”

And then he’s running again, across an open office space, and Bucky’s right at his heels, even when the supposedly bulletproof but currently shattered set of windows making up one wall loom closer and closer.

Steve doesn’t stop, just barrels right through and into the open air.

Bucky’s animal brain screeches in fear, but the rest of him is ready and willing to follow Steve into hell.

And so he does.

His hits the ground with his left shoulder, which hurts a lot less than it would have if it wasn’t strapped down. It still hurts a hell of a lot. Bucky blinks the pain out of his vision and looks to his side, where Steve’s scrambling to his feet with a grimace of his own. He extends a hand to Bucky who grabs it gratefully and lets Steve yank him to his feet.

“Ow,” he says with feeling, and then, “Woah.”

They’re in the Iron Maiden, and Bucky sees just a sliver of the slightly smoking S.H.I.E.L.D building before the door seals shut.

“Tell me we didn’t jump out of a 30th floor window and just happened to fall in here.”

“Such faith, James.” It’s Natasha, standing behind them, dressed in her gear. She’s smirking. “Clint’s at the controls. We didn’t _happen_ to be anywhere.”

Bucky assumed as much, but still. What the fuck?

“You’re all crazy,” he says and doesn’t bother hiding his admiration.

“You’ll fit right in, won’t you?” she says before sauntering off, punching Steve lightly in the bicep as she does.

“You will, you know,” Steve says in her wake. When Bucky turns to him, he’s looking at Bucky with gentle concern.

“I know I will.” He leans up for a kiss, delighted when Steve meets him halfway. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

They stand there, exchanging lazy kisses as the Iron Maiden flies – well, not home, not yet, but a place that can be home, if Bucky will let it.

He intends to.

-

“Wait,” he gasps several minutes later, stiffening up in Steve’s lap. “What about Stark?”

Steve waves a dismissive hand.

“Tony will make his own way home. Apparently, he’s not done having fun yet.”

“But–”

“It’s okay, Buck. Don’t worry. S.H.I.E.L.D won’t get him.”

“If you’re sure,” Bucky says dubiously, a little distracted by Steve’s kiss-swollen mouth.

“I’m sure.”

The hand curved around his nape tugs him forward, and Bucky’s helpless to resist.

-

Bucky spends ten hours as a very disgruntled patient in Base Three’s infirmary. Steve, bless him, keeps him company until Stark and a woman who introduces herself as Helen Cho bustles in and kicks him out.

Well, it’s more that Stark says, “Fury’s on the line with some very creative threats that Widow’s having way too much fun countering, fucking get that under control before he tries to nuke us,” and Dr. Cho says something about patient confidentiality, and Bucky makes reassuring eyes at him through the pleasant fog of consensually administered anesthesia – but Steve goes.

He’s not there when Bucky wakes the first time, sees the empty metal cap where his left arm should be, forgets everything Stark and Cho told him, and panics until he passes out again.

Next time, Steve is there, seated on a chair that must be hell on his old-man back and holding Bucky’s hand like an absolute sweetheart.

Bucky’s heart does a Thing.

He must make some lovestruck noise because Steve’s eyes fly to his face. They’re wary and intent, but whatever he sees on Bucky’s face makes him relax visibly. He smiles one of those eye-crinkling smiles, and Bucky honest-to-god sighs.

“Hey, kid,” Steve murmurs, leaning in and cupping Bucky’s face with one huge palm that blocks out the world.

“Hey,” Bucky garbles back, probably with hearts in his eyes.

“How you feeling?”

“Good. Really good.” All that happened filters back into his conscious mind, and he looks at his left side. His arm’s back. Except, no, not exactly. “It looks the same.”

“It does. Stark liked the aesthetic of the original, and you told him you did too, remember? The insides are all different though. More efficient. They’ll still need to put you under to work on it without causing pain, but minor repairs should be easier now. The old one, Bucky, the electrical charges inside, do you–”

His brain’s a little foggy, but he remembers, very clearly, what Steve’s talking about.

“I didn’t know, no. Pretty sure they weren’t there originally. Probably added them as a contingency for – well, exactly this.”

Steve’s expression shutters for a moment, but there’s a set to his jaw that Bucky identifies as sheer rage. But what he says is, “I’m sorry, Buck.”

“Hmm? Why?”

“I shouldn’t have let you go in there. We knew this might happen and yet–”

“No, no, fuck, I’m gonna stop you right there. Help me sit.”

“Buck–”

“ _Steve_.”

Steve frowns but slides his arm under Bucky and raises him up, easy and gentle. He even arranges the pillows behind Bucky so he can lean back against them comfortably. It’s when Steve pulls back that Bucky notices what he’s wearing.

“He _llo_ ,” he leers, and Steve just blinks at him for a second before comprehension dawns.

“You really like this uniform, huh?”

“Fuck yeah. Where has it been all my life? Combat suit?”

“Yep.”

“ _Goddamn_. I don’t think I can physically do it right now, but if I could, I’d walk my talk and sit on your dick this instant.”

It still makes him fiercely proud to see those words hit Steve. Bucky revels in the closed eyes and hissed breath. The kiss Steve presses to his mouth stays soft and undemanding, but Bucky’s blood sings to feel the violent need brimming under the tenderness.

“You’ll make good on that promise, sweetheart,” Steve murmurs before he pulls away.

“I will,” Bucky agrees dazedly.

They stare dopily at each other for a few moments before Bucky remembers why he went to the trouble of sitting up in the first place.

“Steve. You know it wasn’t your fault. I knew this might happen too, but I went anyway. It was _my_ choice. And I don’t regret it. They didn’t hurt me–” He sees the storm brewing in Steve’s eyes and hurries to add, “Okay, the arm was a dick move, and I’d punch Fury for that. But if S.H.I.E.L.D wanted to really harm me, they’d have done a lot worse than lock me up in a temporary cell and leave me to stew. I’m pretty sure they were just keeping me until, I don’t know, I changed my mind or Fury traced the doc Stark put in their system and brought the wrath of S.H.I.E.L.D Legal down on my head. And fuck all this, even if they’d really tried to hurt me, I wouldn’t have been scared. You know why?”

Steve looks like he has an inkling of the answer, but he dutifully asks, “Why?”

“Because I knew you’d come for me.”

Steve says nothing, but his hands bracket Bucky’s face and hold him so gently it hurts, and that says enough.

Bucky manages to let Steve cradle his flaming face and make moon-eyes at him for a few minutes before the squirming in his insides get too much. He breaks away with a shy smile he can’t hide and tries to save his composure by focusing on his new arm. 

A quick visual examination makes it seem much like his old one, except for one glaring new detail.

“This Stark’s idea?” Bucky asks, raising a brow at the black, stylized A painted on the bicep. It’s the Avengers symbol, but what’s notable is that it’s nestled inside a very familiar white star.

Steve sighs.

“Yes. I tried to talk him out of it or ask you first. He said he would but, well. He’s Tony.”

“You know, I get that, and I barely know the guy.” He turns to shoot Steve a grin that almost falters at the caution clear in his expression. “Aw, Steve. C’mon. I quit my job for you. Bearing your star on my shoulder ain’t where I draw the line.”

“I doubt it’s even my star at this point but try telling Tony that.”

Bucky reaches out and strokes Steve’s beard, shivering to feel the bristles on his palm.

“It’s yours, as far as I’m concerned. This one, on my shoulder. It’s yours, Steve.”

 _I’m yours_ , he doesn’t say, but he thinks the sentiment comes across loud and clear.

Steve covers Bucky’s hand with his own, leaning his face into their joined palms.

“Yeah. Yeah, I know. Me too, Buck.”

-

“You sure about this?” he asks Steve, trying to keep his thirst at bay and act professional. “You never go out on missions.”

Steve raises an eyebrow at Bucky without even pausing in pulling on his uniform, the combat one that is easy as hell on Bucky’s eyes but hard as hell a little further south, literally.

“Okay, fine, you came to rescue me, but you’re always on command otherwise!”

“Do you not want me to go with you?”

“No!” Bucky rubs a hand over his face like that’ll douse the heat on his cheeks. “I just – worry. Sorry.”

Steve softens a little at that, easing up on the stern-and-ready-to-fuck-you-up aura he’s been projecting since morning. Commander Rogers is, Bucky has discovered, much more chill than Man-on-a-Mission-Rogers.

Bucky goes easily when Steve pulls him close. Their respective suits make it hard to mold together the way they usually do, but Bucky can still tuck his face into Steve’s neck and breathe in the calming scent of him.

“It’s a tradition,” Steve tells him, hooking his chin over Bucky’s head. The angle strains his voice, makes it low and raspy. “New members always go on a two-man run with me once they’re ready.”

“Interesting tradition.”

“I didn’t set out to do it. Did it build trust with Nat, show her I knew she had my back. Same with Clint. Then Tony built that suit, joined us, and wheedled me into a run. After that, it sort of kept happening. Now it’s tradition.” Steve leans back and tips Bucky’s face up, thumb coming to rest at the corner of his mouth. “Can’t fuck with tradition, Buck.”

“God forbid,” Bucky says drily. “I’m not – I want to, you know. And I saw the footage of you fighting the Chitauri. You ain’t as rusty as the S.H.I.E.L.D file on you hopes.”

“I _am_ old. Not as strong as I used to be.” Steve grins, and it’s not forced. He doesn’t seem resentful about the passage of time through his serum-laced body. “But don’t count me out of the game yet, kiddo.”

This time, Bucky flushes for a whole other reason.

“I wouldn’t dare,” he says dreamily and cuts off Steve’s laugh with a kiss.

And of course, Steve turns out to be right.

Their mission is a terrorist cell, this time, and Bucky’s got both live and tranquilizer rounds. On the ground, Steve’s following the same policy; non-lethal force when possible but death is on the cards. It’s a hell of an experience to have him in Bucky’s crosshairs, shield in one hand and bloodied knuckles on the other.

He looks like an angel of war.

Bucky’s worked with most of the other Avengers by now; his favorite so far is Wanda with her well-earned moniker of _witch_. Watching her powers at work still rouses a sense of childlike wonder in him, the kind he hasn’t felt since he was a kid hoarding an eclectic mix of grimdark fairytales and outrageous science fiction.

But this, watching Steve systematically punch his way through their enemies with a grin that’s almost feral – that’s a whole other sort of wonder.

Bucky loses his tenuous hold on self-restraint all too soon and joins Steve on the ground, and then it’s better and worse, the two of them falling into place like two pieces of a puzzle – like fate, like they’re written in the stars.

-

Bucky waits until they’re back on the base and in Steve’s room before trying to climb him like a tree.

Steve, expecting it, barely stumbles when Bucky slams into him. Hoists him up like he’s nothing and slams him into a wall, biting Bucky’s grunt off his lips and licking into his mouth with the taste of blood on his tongue.

Bucky fucking writhes against him, wrapped around Steve like a koala and bursting with faith in the strong arms holding him up. They kiss until Bucky’s panting for breath and his dick feels raw from being strangled by his tac pants.

“You’re worked up,” Steve says, breathing hard and fucking beautiful. “Watching me fight do it for you, son?”

“You know it did,” Bucky says, swatting at Steve until he’s put down. He sets to stripping without preamble, grateful that he disarmed on the Iron Maiden itself because the way he’s yanking at his gear, he’d stab himself if he had his usual arsenal strapped to him.

Steve starts to do the same, but Bucky stops him with a protesting yelp.

“Keep it on, I’ve got plans for that suit.”

Steve remembers, of course he fucking remembers, and he’s crowding Bucky back against the wall with a growl, hands suddenly _everywhere_ , and Bucky just gives himself over to be kissed and groped and stripped out of the rest of his suit by warm, demanding hands.

“Look at you,” Steve says once he’s got Bucky naked and pinned. “Could just eat you up, sweetheart.”

Doesn’t matter how often Steve says it, it still goes straight to Bucky’s hindbrain, gets him trembling and desperate.

“Steve,” he whimpers, begging for something, anything.

“Ssh, I know.” Steve kisses him, faint, fluttery kisses on his mouth and jaw and cheeks and eyes. “Turn around.”

He doesn’t wait for Bucky to coordinate his boneless limbs and turn. Just grabs him by the shoulders and whips him around, leading his arms to brace on the wall. Bucky swears when Steve grabs his hips and yanks them back, hands sliding smoothly to his ass to spread them.

“Pretty and eager,” he croons, pressing a thumb against Bucky’s hole. “Can’t wait to get fucked full, can you, kid?”

“You know I can’t,” Bucky whines, high and shameless. He thrusts his ass further out, biting his lips when Steve squeezes the cheeks hard. “Sir, please, c’mon.”

“Patience,” Steve warns, but he doesn’t make Bucky wait. A moment later, there’s warm breath brushing his ass and Steve’s spreading him wider. Bucky holds his breath in anticipation, but the first touch of Steve’s beard to his skin still pulls a gasp out of him. It devolves into a high-pitched moan when Steve presses his face between Bucky’s cheeks, opening him wider with intent.

His legs are shaking already, and Bucky’s not sure he can survive what’s coming.

Steve doesn’t ease him into it. Not teasing nips or sweet kisses. He just fucking goes for it, licking a broad stripe along Bucky’s hole and tracing his tongue around the rim, getting him wet and sloppy in a matter of seconds, then pushing further. His tongue slides in, Steve’s mouth open and _hot_ around his hole, and Bucky fucking wails.

There are slick, dirty noises coming from below, and it’s too much, all of it, and he wants to look over his shoulder and see, but he’s not that strong a soul. No one’s made to survive Steve Rogers with his face buried in their ass, but damn if Bucky minds dying like this.

Steve eats him out until Bucky’s shuddering all over and begging senselessly. He takes his sweet time pulling back, kissing him there like it’s Bucky’s mouth he’s licking into and sucking bruises down the slope of his thighs before finally rising. Bucky’s knees buckle without Steve to keep him steady, but he doesn’t hit the ground; he’s swept up, instead, and carried right to Steve’s bed, dumped on it like he’s a simpering maiden about to be ravished by some big brute.

And sweet fuck, there’s an image.

Steve looms over him, peering down at Bucky with dark eyes and red, red lips. Bucky hole throbs at the sight, wet and _empty_ , and he reaches for Steve desperately. Steve’s got him though, Steve’s always got him, and Bucky’s cradled and kissed and wrestled into his lap in just a few, frenzied moments. He braces his hands on Steve’s shoulders and rises to his knees, still feeling exquisitely weak all over but determined to do this.

“Said I’d sit on your dick,” he tells Steve, taking his face between his hands and getting a little distracted by that beard and those lips and – and everything. He kisses him, once and again, then again, before tearing his mouth away with effort. “C’mon, sir, gimme.”

“We’re pushy today,” Steve says indulgently, hands already working on his pants.

Bucky watches hungrily and moans when Steve pulls his cock out. It’s hard already, flushed a mouth-watering red, but Bucky’s got his priorities this time.

Steve hands him something, and it takes Bucky a moment to tear his eyes off Steve’s dick and look at it. It’s lube, and when he turns to Steve, he finds him leaning back in the wall, the very picture of relaxation.

“Get to work, Buck,” he orders, crooked grin tugging at Bucky’s gut. “I’ll watch.”

Bucky ducks his face, intensely aware of Steve’s eyes as he wets his fingers and reaches behind himself. Steve’s mouth already loosened him up some, and it’s easy enough to slide in a couple of digits and fuck into himself, harsh and a little violent, the way he likes it. He teases himself with glancing touches to his prostate and adds another finger. It’s better, the friction more satisfying, but it’s not enough. Nothing will be until Steve’s in so deep that Bucky can barely breathe around him.

He finishes the prep, eager for Steve, but when he tries to position himself, Steve stops him, taking him by the hips and keeping him right where he is.

“ _Sir_ ,” Bucky whines, laughing the next moment when Steve flicks his forehead.

“Behave, brat.”

Bucky does, staying where Steve put him even when he’s all but vibrating out of his skin when Steve’s hands take a slow, groping detour to Bucky’s ass.

“Gotta make sure,” Steve says, lust-bright eyes not once leaving Bucky’s face. “Can’t have my boy hurt himself, can I?”

“Sir,” Bucky gasps, a shiver seizing him. “But I did good.”

Steve hums noncommittally, but Bucky chokes on his next protest when Steve slides in with two fingers and fucking spreads them, knuckles grinding against the rim. Bucky digs his fingers into Steve’s arms and arches his back, panting as he fights not to ride Steve’s hand.

“Yeah,” Steve breathes. He’s smiling, dark and promising. “You did good, Buck.”

“Told you,” Bucky says, pleased and petulant. “Can I please ride you, sir?”

“Now he’s polite,” Steve murmurs as he leans back, waving one hand in permission. The absolute fucker. Bucky’s so gone on him.

Steve’s silky soft and so hot in his flesh hand, and Bucky can’t resist giving it a sweet stroke or two. Fluid beads at the tip in response and he catches it on his thumb before raising it to his mouth and sucking, holding Steve’s gaze as he does.

“Kid,” Steve growls. “Get to it before I bend you in half and have my way till you scream.”

Bucky shudders, a wounded noise punched out of him. Fuck, he wants that, but he wants this too, and it gets him moving, sinking down on Steve’s cock. Doesn’t matter how many times he takes it, he’s breathless and straining every time, stretched wide around the sheer girth and gutted by the way it goes deep and deeper and keeps fucking going.

He's got one hand pressed against his stomach by the time he’s seated on Steve’s lap, and he knows he can’t, but he still thinks he should be able to feel Steve bulge out there with how deep he is in Bucky.

“Sweetheart,” Steve whispers, stroking Bucky’s hair out of his face. “You good?”

“S’always good, with you,” Bucky says honestly, slurring a little. “Just – gimme a sec.”

Steve nuzzles at him, and Bucky shamelessly rubs his face against his beard. He’s never going to tire of that, and as far as he’s concerned, beard burn on his ass is a bonus. He’ll be reminded, every fucking moment for days, of the things Steve did to him.

He starts moving, impatient to feel it, the burn inside and the wet-hot slide of Steve’s cock. He doesn’t take it easy, and Steve doesn’t make him, watching with hungry eyes as Bucky builds himself up into a frenzy, bouncing up and down Steve’s lap with tight, desperate cries spilling from his lips. Steve slips out, once, and Bucky scrambles to get him back inside, throwing his head back to scream when Steve jerks his hips up and fucks all the way into Bucky on one, savage thrust.

“God,” Bucky sobs. “Again, again, _please_ –”

And Steve gives it to him, fucking up while Bucky drives down, their bodies meeting with slick slaps of controlled violence. Steve tugs Bucky forward into his torso, tucking him against him, and Bucky goes with it sweetly, letting Steve hold and take over the work. The hand not holding Bucky to him creeps down to grab one cheek and spread him wide, and Bucky doesn’t need to hear Steve’s bitten-off curse to know he’s watching over Bucky’s shoulder. Bucky tries to imagine it, his ass bouncing with the force of their fucking, Steve’s dick vanishing between his cheeks, and it’s too much to picture, drives him fucking crazy and gets him squirming like that will coax Steve in deeper.

Steve’s murmuring in his ear, a coarse, wrecked litany of Bucky’s name and sweet nonsense, and he doesn’t stop thrusting, goes at it faster, making Bucky rock in his lap, held in place only by Steve’s strength.

“Touch yourself,” Steve orders, voice hoarse in a telling way. “Want you to come on my cock.”

Bucky’s obeying blindly before the words are all the way out. The slide of cool metal on his dick makes him hiss, but the likes the sensation of it, the shock of the touch settling into dizzying pleasure. It doesn’t take much, just a few, rough pulls and a flick at the head for him to come, making a mess on his skin and Steve’s suit.

He'd apologize, but he doesn’t have the breath for it, and Steve doesn’t care, groaning fitfully and speeding up, fucking Bucky raw as he chases his climax. Bucky tries to clench around him, head spinning from oversensitivity, and fuck but he loves this part, the way he’s barely clinging to sense while Steve takes what he needs.

The burst of heat inside him rips another cry out of him, weak and guttural. Steve echoes it, panting praises into Bucky’s ear as his hips jerk erratically through his orgasm.

He slips out, soft and with come trailing in his wake. Bucky shivers at the sticky warmth of it and tries to clench up, keep all of Steve inside of him.

They catch their breaths like that, Steve slumped against the wall and Bucky collapsed on him. They manage, after a while, to wrangle their soupy limbs and lie down properly, all tangled up. There’s nowhere Bucky feels as safe as he does in Steve’s arms, and it should be a at least a little terrifying, that epiphany, but it’s only comforting when he has Steve octopused around him, breathing into his hair.

“I think I love you,” Bucky says. Doesn’t mean to, sure as fuck doesn’t plan to, but he does, and it’s out there, and oddly enough, he doesn’t tense up, doesn’t flare up in fear. His heart’s racing, but anticipation is a hell of a drug.

“Yeah?” Steve murmurs, dragging his mouth out of Bucky’s hair to press to his temple. “Not the sex talking?”

“Don’t insult me, Steve,” Bucky says calmly, like his heart isn’t in his throat.

“Wouldn’t dare, sweetheart. I love you too. Always knew I’d end up here. Was hoping you would too.”

“Sap,” Bucky accuses, not quite keeping his delight out of his voice.

“Your sap.”

Bucky presses his face to Steve’s neck to stifle a jubilant cry. He doesn’t quite manage it, but the trembling keen he lets slip just makes Steve’s arms tighten around him and his mouth curve into a smile against Bucky’s forehead.

“Mine,” Bucky agrees, hopelessly in love with the way his mouth shapes those sounds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sappy ending is Sappy. This is the end of the main story. I have a pwp 3rd part I want to post, with zero plot for once.
> 
> Come talk to me!

**Author's Note:**

> Drop me a comment if you can!


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